It's Hard to See
by Username1.4
Summary: "If the girl fell in love with a man who also fell in love with her by the sunset of her twenty first birthday, then she and her staff would be restored back into the humans they were born to be. The rose would bloom until that day. When it withered and died, the girl would know that all her hope is lost. It's been almost ten years, and that girl is still alive, Monsieur." COMPLETE
1. Anniversary

**Chapter 1 **

**Damian**

Damian Labarre walked briskly through town, not wanting to stay there too long. He dodged behind carts, skirted around the women with their children, and stayed on the lookout for Genevieve Fleour. He swore that she would be the death of him. Damian had only been trying to be friendly to the girl, back when she moved in, but she took it as more than it was. Pretty soon, Damian found himself the victim of a love struck stalker. Most days he would humor her when she decided to show her beautiful face, but not today. Right then, he really just wanted to get to the bookstore, pick up what he needed, and be on his not-so-merry way back home.

He ignored the villager's mumblings about how odd he was just because he wasn't married yet, and because he liked to keep his hair short, and because he didn't know what he wanted to do with his life yet, and rushed into his sanctuary- the bookstore.

The building was old, but safe. There were cobwebs gathered in the corners, and no one bothered sweeping them out because they knew the cobwebs would just come back in a few days. The lighting was always dim, but it added to the cozy environment the shopkeeper had established. The smell that hung in the air was always of old paper and bread, but Damian liked it- it reminded him of his sister.

"Hello, Damian," François said kindly. His loose skin folds crinkled together in the familiar pattern of his smile lines as he welcomed Damian into his store.

"Hello, François," Damian answered back. "Do you happen to have a book called… _It Happened at Midnight_?" François's brows knit as he rubbed his forehead.

"Well, yes. I suppose I do. Were you planning on buying it?"

Damian scratched the back of his neck before nodding sheepishly.

"My sister's favorite book," he said. François nodded,

"Wasn't going to ask,"

Damian rolled his eyes as he took out the money for the book. François strolled comfortably through the long halls of books before stopping in the third row, near the end. He pulled out a single, brand new book with a blue cover out of the shelf. He rang Damian up and smiled kindly,

"We all miss her,"

Damian nodded sadly, not giving eye contact. He shoved the book into the worn leather satchel slung over his shoulder. In front of the door, before he dove back into the hectic stream of life in his village, Damian took a deep breath of the comforting scents of paper and bread. He walked out, ready to face anything he needed to.

He thought he might be able to make it. So, of course he didn't. Less than one hundred feet from his and his father's small cottage, he was ambushed by the one person he really didn't have the patience for today.

"Damian! Wait up, I have something to talk to you about!"

He mentally cringed and swallowed his sigh before it passed his lips.

"Genevieve. What a surprise,"

"A pleasant one, I should hope," she giggled. Her golden shoulder length hair shifted in the wind, and she shivered in her thin red dress. This time, Damian couldn't stop the sigh.

"Is there anything you need?"

"Yes! Actually, that's what I wanted to talk to you about. As you know, you're unmarried, and that isn't a very popular idea in our village- for a man your age to be unwed-"

"I'm only twenty-one!" He argued, "I've heard of places where people don't wed until they are forty years of age," Genevieve stared at him, uncomprehending, for a few seconds. Damian ran his hand over his face before saying, "Never mind. What were you saying, dear?"

"Ah! Yes. It is very odd for someone your age to be unwed. And as you know, I, too, am unwed," Damian mentally groaned. He bit his lip, but missed how Genevieve's blue eyes followed his mouth's movements. "So, here's where my thoughts went: What if we wed each other?" Genevieve's eyes bore into Damian's, "It would be perfect! Your father loves me, and my father really likes you. Plus, look at us! We're both gorgeous, and we were meant to be together. So… ask me!"

At that point, Damian was completely flustered and red faced. His mouth flapped open, but he quickly closed it and swallowed. Genevieve's eyes watched the bouncing motion of his Adam's apple.

"Don't worry," She laughed when Damian didn't say anything, "I know what you're thinking, and- no. This is not a joke. I won't reject you,"

Luckily, before Damian said anything, Louis appeared.

"Are you sure about that? Because I mean business," and he winked at her. Genevieve rolled her eyes at him. "Will you marry me?" Louis asked, not bothering about Genevieve's obvious signs of disinterest. Genevieve started to yell at him, and Damian, as rude as it was, started running away.

At the front door of his house, he nearly collapsed with relief. He hated his village, and everyone in his village- except for two people- hated him, too. Of those two people, Damian only cared for one person: his father. The other person was Genevieve.

Damian was knocked out of his thoughts by the sound of harsh coughing. He placed his satchel on their small kitchen table and he wandered down to his basement. There, he saw his father, hard at work, like always.

"Dad, you need to rest. You can't keep doing this to yourself,"

"Doing what?" In that one sentence alone, Gerard Labarre coughed at least fifteen times. Damian sighed. Stubborn old man.

"Come on, Dad. It can wait until tomorrow,"

"No! I'm leaving for the convention tomorrow! I have to finish today, Son, you know that,"

Damian pursed his lips,

"You know what the doctor said. Don't overexert yourself,"

"It's not overexerting," his dad huffed, "I've been doing this for years, never been a problem before,"

"Yeah, well…" Damian trailed off. Before, the old man had Damian's sister- Lilith. But exactly one year ago, she was mauled to death by a pack of wolves. The old man was lucky he was only as injured as he was. Damian didn't need to say all of that, his father understood. The old man heaved a big sigh and set down his wrench.

"Fine," he said softly, "I'll just… go to bed, then,"

"I'm serious, Dad," Damian said, "Don't go tomorrow,"

The Frenchman waved his son off as he waddled up to his bed. Damian rolled his eyes.

The next morning, Damian woke up to a cold house. Feeling panic speed up the beating of his heart, he shoved the covers off his body. His father couldn't be… not after Damian just lost Lilith. He ran to his father's room, and halted in confusion. His father wasn't in his room, but everything was just as messy as his father usually left it. Getting an inkling of an idea on where his father went, Damian slowly went down to the basement, shivering the entire way. Halfway down, he lost feeling in his fingers and toes and the tips of his nose and ears. His breath puffed out in visible clouds. When he reached the bottom, he bit his bottom lip and shook his head in disbelief. His father's invention was missing; he had gone to the inventor's convention after all. Stubborn old man.


	2. Wolves

**Chapter 2 **

**Gerard**

Gerard looked at the forest paths again, trying to lead Philippe in the right direction, for once. It was already dusk. He had missed the inventor's convention, but that didn't matter. He patted his faithful horse's neck in what he hoped was in a reassuring way. Gerard was lost. Not just lost in a village or town. No. He was lost in the middle of the never ending woods, at the exact time of year when his village stopped sending out search parties into said woods. Gerard looked around him and turned Philippe around. He had his invention sliding behind him, but at that moment, Gerard wasn't worried about it at all. He had his blueprints in his basement. If he needed to, he could have simply rebuilt it. What he was worried about were the noises he was hearing behind him. Howling and panting and snow crunching under multiple pairs of paws. In a word: wolves.

Making an executive, life-or-death decision, Gerard unlatched the sled with his invention and urged Philippe into a trot, trying to stay ahead of the wolves. He remembered how his daughter died. The setting was eerily similar to what it was right then. Maybe the Almighty had decreed that Gerard was meant to end at the teeth and claws of wolves, but Gerard found that he himself didn't care. As the savage noises grew closer, Gerard didn't even need to tell him, Philippe started cantering, and then galloping all on his own.

Gerard suddenly felt extremely confused. One second he was on his horse- Philippe. The next, he was there, on the icy ground. He found that he didn't have much time to process the change, either. The wolves were gaining, and he needed to run.

Lilith had tried to play dead the first time Gerard was at the mercy of the wolves. Foolishly, Gerard had agreed to the plan. It worked for bears, didn't it? Why not for wolves? What Lilith and Gerard hadn't known was that wolves were a great deal more intelligent than bears. They would eat carcasses, if they were hungry. And that day, they had been practically starving.

Gerard shook off the thought as he scrambled through the forest. Occasionally, he would have to use a rough branch to pull himself up a steep snow bank. So, he found himself with bloody hands, aching legs, and burning lungs. He pushed himself forward, nearly crying in pain.

It seemed that some divine being felt pity for Gerard that day. In front of him slowly emerged a rusty old gate, dutifully guarding a cursed looking castle, looking nothing like the one Lilith had worked in. Gerard pushed himself forward. He could feel the warm breath of a wolf on the back of his neck, and hear the excited yips of the pack from all around him.

He pushed through the surprisingly sturdy iron bars and scrambled to close the door. His fingers were nearly bitten off, but he was safe. He was alone in the middle of the woods somewhere and his horse had run off without him and his son was in their village probably very angry with him, but… Gerard was alive.

Gerard started hobbling to the front doors of the castle. He would see if anyone still lived there. If so, he would simply have to convince the Master or Mistress to let him stay the night. If not… nobody's luck was good enough to evade blood-thirsty wolves for a third time.

The old man pushed the large front doors open and shuffled inside, trying to regain feeling in his feet and face. He coughed a couple of times before calling out in a hoarse voice,

"Hello?" he moved forward a couple more paces before collapsing against the door as he coughed. Strange, he didn't remember closing the door. Before he submitted to the darkness, Gerard noticed a large shadow cross in front of him. Then, he was out cold.


	3. First Encounters

**Chapter 3: Gerard**

Gerard woke up and groaned. He was aching all over, and his chest felt like Philippe was sitting on it. He was in a strange room, not used very often, if the smell of the dust that hung in the air was any indication. The styling of the room seemed to be, fashionably, from about twenty years ago. Gerard was still lost, except now he was even more lost than he had been in the woods; he didn't even know whose house he was staying in. From the window in his room, he could tell that it was cold outside; far too cold to go out in, that was for sure.

The one bright side to the morning was that Gerard was warm. Even in his familiar house back at the village, his house was never this toasty. He snuggled further into the covers, ignoring the musty scent it carried, then fell back into a deep sleep.

A while later, Gerard woke up again, feeling more rested than he had been in a year. Gerard grunted as he sat up. He looked around the room again, and was pleasantly surprised as he looked at the bedside table. There was a bowl of soup, with small chunks of some sort of meat and vegetables. It was still warm enough to steam. Forcing down his urge to laugh in happiness, Gerard carefully took the bowl and set it in his lap, then started sipping at it, savoring the taste, too hungry to care where it came from.

Lilith used to cook for him and Damian. Since she passed, Damian was forced to cook for the two of them because Gerard was a terrible cook. Unfortunately for both of them, Damian inherited many things from his father, including his talent for cooking. In all honesty, Gerard wasn't exactly sure how he and Damian had survived that past year.

After Gerard finished the soup, not a drop left in the bowl, he reached to put the bowl back, but was surprised again to find even more than before waiting for him. He paused. He could have sworn he hadn't seen anyone enter his room, so how had the glass of water arrived? Gerard chalked it up to him being dazed and tired. Maybe the glass had already been there and he simply hadn't seen it there. He nodded. Yes, that was the only explanation.

"How are you feeling, Monsieur?" a voice called as soon as Gerard placed an empty glass back on the bed side table. Gerard looked around for a minute. No one was there. He froze. Was the castle haunted? Was this truly too good to be true?

"F-fine. I'm feeling much better, thank you," Gerard stuttered. Might as well appease the spirits, then maybe he had a chance to escape some day.

"Ah! That's wonderful new! Our mistress was very worried about you, you know," the voice said cheerfully.

"U-um, sorry to be a bother, but… where are you?"

"Right here, Monsieur, on the bed side table,"

"On the…?" Gerard turned in wonder and realized that he was speaking to a candelabrum. He even had a little face carved into his wax and everything. Somehow the voice came out from somewhere inside, but the face stayed absolutely still. It unnerved Gerard somewhat. More than that, though, he was fascinated. Who had invented such an ingenious device? It seemed to contain intelligence all its own, and even spoke as if it could hear Gerard's answers. Gerard picked up the device and started fiddling with it, trying to find any cogs or gears. He was so intently studying the specimen that he almost didn't hear it speaking again.

"Monsieur? Monsieur?"

"Hmm? Yes… uh, sorry, I've seemed to miss your name. That is, if you've got one,"

"A name? Of course I have one: Lumiere it is,"

"Ah. Well then, Lumiere, what were you saying?"

"The Mistress wishes for you to know that almost the entire castle is at your disposal. You must only stay away from the east wing. This is not so hard, yes?"

"Of course. She saved my life, your Mistress did. So, when do I get to meet her?"

"Meet her?" the candelabrum seemed shocked. His wicks even lit on fire. Lumiere quickly swatted them out, but his facial expression was smudged in the process. Lumiere ignored Gerard's shock that the candelabrum could bend in such a way and said, "You can't meet the Mistress!" it seemed like this was an obvious thing. Still, Gerard couldn't help his questions- he was an inventor, after all. A scientist. A researcher by nature.

"But why not?"

"Oh," Lumiere seemed to deflate and he drooped. "She is very self conscious about her looks. I'm afraid you would run away in terror if you saw her, and she knows it, too,"

"Nonsense! All women are a gift from the Almighty, they all possess beauty in their own individual way. I'm sure she's beautiful,"

"I know that. The rest of us all know that. But no one else does. I'm sorry, Monsieur, but I must be firm with this: you cannot see the Mistress. Ever," Gerard nodded sadly. Lumiere said one last thing before he left with the dishes, but Gerard wasn't paying attention. Who could possibly make a woman feel ugly enough to hide in the middle of the woods for twenty years? Gerard shook his head. He would meet the Mistress, and he would make her feel beautiful. What could she be, anyway, if her staff consisted of a candelabrum? Maybe she was a poorly carved dresser?

Gerard chuckled to himself as he stood up slowly. He walked around the room for a while, but he was still tired and weak, so he soon lay back down and went back to sleep.

When Gerard awoke, he looked to the table by his bedside. The candelabrum wasn't there. Of course it wasn't. There is no such thing as talking candelabras. He probably just imagined the entire conversation in a pain-induced haze.

Gerard groaned lightly as he tried to stand up, and looked around the room again. The wallpaper was a light pink with flowers of cream. There was crown molding on the corners of the room, and all the wood was polished and a beautiful shade of red-brown. Feeling quite desperate and quite silly, Gerard slowly stood up and walked towards a chair.

"Hello," he said quietly. He looked around and sighed. No one was there to see him utterly embarrass himself. He continued, "Hello, there. My name is Gerard. What might yours be?" When the chair didn't answer, Gerard silently cursed himself. Of course the chair wouldn't talk back! It's a chair, for Pete's sake! Before he could berate himself even more, Gerard heard laughing from behind him. He spun around, was he not alone in the house? And… did they see him attempt to talk to a chair?

"The chairs do not speak, Monsieur," It was the little candelabrum from Gerard's imagination. Joy. "I would have thought you to know that,"

"Oh, yes," Gerard mumbled, "Silly me,"

"Mistress inquired about your health again. How are you feeling, Monsieur?"

"Oh, I'm feeling quite alright. Just a bit… overwhelmed. Are you the only one in the Mistress's staff?"

"Oh, no, Monsieur. The Mistress has a very large staff. Two hundred and seventy four individuals, and I am in charge of all of them,"

"So, you are a very important character here?"

"The second most important!" Lumiere boasted, "Second only to the Mistress herself!"

"I beg your pardon!" another voice chimed in. It was slightly nasally and it huffed as a small clock waddled into the room.

"Hush, Coggy. I am the second most important one here!" Lumiere turned to Gerard and asked, sounding embarrassed, "Monsieur, if it's not too much to ask, could you change my smile into a frown?"

"Don't listen to him, my good sir! I am the most important, directly beneath the Mistress!"

"How about we go and meet the Mistress in person? Then she can tell you herself who is the second most important," Gerard said. He was, after all, a scientist. His unquenchable curiosity got him to where he was in his life now. Stuck in an abandoned castle in the middle of the woods after nearly getting mauled to death by wolves. On second thought, Gerard thought that maybe he should re-think his philosophy about the questions.

"Yes, yes, wonderful idea, Sir!" the clock said.

"Oui! You are a smart one, Monsieur!"

So, Gerard followed the clock and the candelabrum as they hobbled and hopped into the east wing.

A low, gravelly voice came out of one of the dark and demolished rooms.

"So, how is he?"

This was their _Mistress?_ She sounded more like a Master. Maybe she was just sick.

"He's fine, Mistress, but we have a question for you," Lumiere said. He sounded very cross.

"We?" The Mistress asked, amused.

"Oui. We: me and Coggy,"

"Don't call me that! My name is Cogsworth! My father's name was Cogsworth, his father's name was Cogsworth, and his father before him was named Cogsworth! Stop calling me Coggy or Coggs or Dogsworth! It's disrespectful and degrading and demeaning!"

"Mistress, are you hearing this? Obviously someone so immature cannot be your second-in-command? Please, Mistress, I am second in importance here only to you, correct?"

"Immature?" the clock sputtered. His ticking came faster and faster, and the minute hand started moving around the face of the clock faster and faster. "_I'm_ the immature one?"

"Second-in-command?" the voice laughed as a figure emerged from the dark doorway. "What are you-" the figure stopped talking when it saw Gerard. Gerard, in the meanwhile, was shocked.

The figure lumbered at least three and a half feet above him, maybe more. It had to stoop its head to even fit in the hallway. Its paws had claws at least two inches long, and the legs were long and muscular, like a wolf's. The entire back of it was made of scales and even led into a thick corded tail which wrapped around its ankles. The worst part for Gerard, though, was the face. It was almost exactly like a wolf's. Almost exactly like the beast which killed his daughter. The only difference was that this wolf had demonic horns jutting out of its beastly skull. It was horrifying.

_This_ was the mansion's Mistress? _This_ beast was the one who allowed its servants to care for him and feed him? _This_ was the beast who daily asked about his well-being?

Gerard started to move backwards as the beast's previous amused and easy-going attitude melted away.

"Who is this?" it yelled at the still-arguing clock and candelabrum. As soon as the beast roared at them they ceased their bantering and assessed their situation. It was clear when they realized the mistake they made.

"Mistress, we are so sorry!"

"You better be! What did I say about letting him see me!" the beast screeched. It's low growling voice echoed through the halls and chilled Gerard to the bone. He wanted to stagger back and run away, but his body was frozen.

"Now now, Mademoiselle, there's no need to be afraid," the candelabrum soothed. Gerard stood in shock. There was no need for _her_ to be afraid? What could she possibly be afraid of?

"You," the beast started quieting, but the rumbling from its throat inspired a fresh sheet of sweat to find its way onto Gerard. "You brought him here. I thought I could at least count on you!"

"You can count on us, Mistress, we didn't mean to-"

"You brought him here!" the beast moaned. "You brought him here and now he's going to run away! And I'll be all alone again! And then he'll bring his people here and they'll kill me! What's wrong with me, Lumiere? Every time I try to show some form of kindness, it ends up cursing me to an even worse fate than I already have!"

Gerard still couldn't move. He was still trying to wrap his head around what was happening. This beast… it had feelings. No, she had feelings. He had said it earlier, and he truly meant it. The Almighty made every female on the planet beautiful in her own way. This female's beauty had yet to be discovered, that was all. And he was a researcher, a man of science. The only person better suited to this job would be his son.

"Oh, this is Gerard. He's not so bad! I'm sure he will not try to kill anyone who showed him as great of a kindness as you have shown him," Lumiere assured.

"Isn't that right, Gerard?" If clocks could give an evil eye, this one did.

"O-of course not!" Gerard stammered. The beast looked at him with eyes so full of despair and sorrow that his heart broke a little. He found an unreasonable amount of courage in himself and blurted out, "I think myself to be a decent man with a right head on my shoulders. If I wouldn't be too much of a bother, I would like to thank the Mistress of the house myself for her hospitableness,"

The beast was curled up on the floor. She raised her head and blinked with unnervingly human-like eyes.

"You… would?" She looked at the candelabrum and the clock and seemed to understand whatever it was they were doing. To Gerard it simply looked as if they were jumping up and down and twisting in the air. The beast nodded and said, "I have time… if you have time,"

"Then, thank you, Mademoiselle, for your hospitality,"

Gerard only noticed that the beast's ears were pressed against her skull after she has lifted them.

"Your very welcome, Monsieur,"

"I was hoping," Gerard was cut off by a series of coughs. He actually hadn't been coughing nearly as much since he had started resting in the Mistress's castle, and the cough attacks he did still have didn't last nearly as long as they used to. The beast waited patiently for him to finish, wringing her paws in the meantime. "If it wouldn't be too much of a bother… could I spend a while longer here?"

"But of course, Monsieur, why would you even need to ask?" Lumiere interjected.

"You can continue staying in the room you're in now, or if you would like a different room, I could have another servant of mine show you the others?" the beast offered, growling lowly.

"Well, could I look through the rooms, but still keep the room I'm in now?"

"You are our guest, Sir. Simply ask and it will be done!" the clock- Cogsworth- said, almost offended.

"Then, I would like to survey all the room in the mansion, and if she has enough time to spare, I would like to explore them with the Mistress,"

All eyes turned to the beast. All she said was,

"My name is Bella," and she went back into her room. Gerard turned to the candelabrum and clock, but they seemed as confused as he was. The Mistress was back within a minute, this time wearing a dark purple robe, large enough to cover her head and trail past her legs. At Gerard's questioning look, she explained, "So you don't feel uncomfortable or scared. I know my looks are scary and hideous and-"

Bella was cut off by a couple of hits to the legs by her loyal servants- the candelabrum and the clock.

"Well then," Bella started again, "Let's begin the tour!"

As they walked through the expanse of the mansion, Gerard asked Bella many questions. He started with simple ones: "Was this person real?" "Is this your favorite room?" "What's your favorite color?" but quickly evolved to more and more involved and personal questions. Bella was extremely patient through the whole ordeal.

"A few minutes ago, with Lumiere and Cogsworth, Lumiere told you not to be afraid. What were you afraid of? Is there a larger… problem I should be aware of?"

Her ears pressed flat against her head again and she growled. Gerard worried he had done something wrong and was afraid for the split second before he saw her eyes. They were terrified. She wrung her paws and her gaze avoided him. Did… did the growling mean that she was… afraid? Not angry?

"Come on then, Bella. What were you afraid of?" She made a new sound. After freezing for a second, Gerard realized it was a whine. Then, a crazy thought entered his mind. Was she afraid… of _him?_ "Bella," Gerard said slowly, "Were you afraid… of me?"

"Why do you need to know, Gerard?" She was yelling, but apparently that, too, meant that she was afraid.

"Back at home, I'm an inventor," Gerard started. "That means I question everything I see and make inventions to try to fix it. I don't think I can make an invention for this, but I do think that I can fix your fear," Bella looked down at him, whining softly, "Only, if you tell me what it is exactly, that you are so afraid of," Gerard finished.

"You're a smart man, Gerard," Bella sighed. "Of course I'm afraid of you,"

"But why, my dear?" Bella's ears perked up and she reminded Gerard of an excited puppy. "You're so much bigger than I am,"

Bella grabbed some of her soft-looking fur and pulled.

"I'm so much bigger," she almost sounded bitter, "But there's so many of you. And all you do is hurt me,"

"I'm not quite certain I understand, dear,"

The two of them stopped in front of a room.

"Every couple of months, someone gets lost in these God forsaken woods. And I never let them die. I let them inside and feed them and give them a place to rest until they can leave in good health. All I ever ask of them is that they never come to the east wing. I give them free reign everywhere else on my land and lend them my servants and keep them safe and alive. But they never listen to me.

"They always find some excuse or another to make it to the east wing. And as soon as they see me, they run. They call me a monster and then they run. Most of them stay away and never bother me again, but a few exceptionally horrible people end up coming back, with more of their friends. And they always try to kill me. Men are scary things, but it is a man I need to fix myself. Let's face it, Monsieur. I'm doomed to stay a beast forever,"

"Doomed to stay a beast forever?"

Bella laughed. "You can't have thought that I've always been like this, could you? A man of science such as yourself?"

"Yes, erm… a man of science such as myself," Gerard was embarrassed that he thought such a hideous creature was in fact, a slightly natural mutation of multiple beasts. "How did you become the way you are now?" Gerard asked as they kept moving.

"Before it was just me and my staff living here, there was a family. There was a proud man, a regal queen, and their lonely child- a daughter," the beast began. "The parents were the Lords of the land. They often had to leave for business, but they never took their daughter with them. One day, while they were gone, an old woman came to the front step of the mansion.

"She was an ancient looking creature, with wrinkles as deep as the hatred carved in her heart. Her face was slightly misshapen and her breath was like acid. She knocked on the door of the mansion and asked the Lord's daughter for a place to stay for the night, as it was raining outside. The girl wanted to give the woman a place to stay, but her servants convinced her it was not safe. So, instead, the young girl gave the old woman a glass of water and a blanket and informed the woman that she could stay in the barn if she so wished.

"Now, the old woman grew very angry. She started to glow. The girl and her servants shielded their eyes from the blinding light. Soon enough, a beautiful enchantress stood in place of the old woman. In her hands the glass of water and blanket.

"The woman, now revealed to be an enchantress, scolded the girl and her servants for being so heartless as to turn away a helpless old woman into the rain. She cursed the girl to look on the outside the beast she harbored within herself. She cursed the entire mansion and staff so that the girl wouldn't be alone in her misery- after all, it wasn't only the girl's decision to throw the old woman out.

"Still, the enchantress had to allow the girl some leeway. The Lord's daughter had provided her a blanket and some water. Another light began to form in the enchantress's hands. As soon as the flashes dimmed, there were two completely different objects in the enchantress's hands. In one, a mirror to show the beast the changing outside world. In the other, a rose with a promise of hope.

"If the girl fell in love with a man who also fell in love with her by the sunset of her twenty-first birthday, then she and her staff would be restored back into the humans they were born to be. The rose would bloom until that day. When it withered and died, the girl would know that all her hope is lost.

"It's been almost ten years, Monsieur, and that girl is still alive."

Gerard had to snap himself out of his temporary stupor. The beast- Bella- had such a way with words. And it wasn't only the words which told the story: Bella herself did as well. Her voice softened and became more of a background music to the story playing out it Gerard's head. Her eyes darkened, and if he looked into them, Gerard could swear he was watching the story in taking place. Her entire presence oozed with the tale, and it enchanted Gerard into speechlessness.

"So, the girl in the story was you, then?" Bella nodded. Gerard thought for a second. He was old, and he knew Bella would not fall in love with him. He could not give her any hope, but he could make her feel proud of herself. "My dear, you have a gift,"

"Two, if you were paying attention," Bella muttered, "The mirror and the rose," Gerard chuckled, but said,

"No, Bella. The story. The way you told it, I felt as if I was actually there. How did you do that?"

"Oh," The reptilian tail trailing behind them flicked around a little. "I read books. I read a lot of books. Sometimes I even try to write my own,"

"That's lovely," the next room Gerard and Bella walked into made Gerard smile sadly. "And this is lovely as well,"

"Would you like to stay here instead of your current room?" Bella asked anxiously. She was starting to wring her hands again and she was starting to shout again. Gerard flinched a bit, but when he saw the fear in Bella's eyes, he said,

"No, I do quite like my current room. It's just that I think my son would like this room, if he ever came to be here,"

"You have a son?"

"Yes," Gerard looked down at his wrinkled old hands. "Once upon a time he used to have a sister- my eldest child. Her name was Lilith. But, she passed on last year,"

"What happened to her, if you don't mind me asking?"

"My dear, you've shared quite a lot with me. It's only fair if I swap a sob story as well, though I am nowhere near as eloquent of a speaker as you are, begging your pardon," Bella grinned wolfishly. So as not to hurt her feelings, Gerard swallowed his shiver. "It was almost exactly a year ago today. Me and Lilith were walking through the woods, until a pack of wolves found us. They weren't just regular old wolves, either. They were starving wolves. Lilith- smart girl, my child was- she thought that if bears leave you alone if you play dead, the same principal should apply to wolves. So, we tried it.

"The wolves got to my child first. She screamed and screamed and I just ran away. There was no saving her. I still had to think of my son back at home. He had already lost his mother, and then his sister. He couldn't lose a father, too," Gerard started crying softly, "So I left my dear, dear girl behind and ran back to the village. The hunters took care of the wolves, but my little girl was already gone," Gerard wiped the tears off his face and blew out a puff of air, "That's my story, anyway. And it's not even my story,"

Bella whined. "If I were human I would hug you. But since I can't, I'll just tell you. You did what you had to for your son. You were Lilith's father, but you were also your son's father. Hard choices have to be made sometimes. I'm just sorry that your choice involved the death of a child of yours,"

"Well my dear, what does being human have to do with anything? You can hug me if you want to,"

After a couple of unpracticed arm movements, Bella growled at the air and yelled out to no one in particular,

"I don't know what to do!"

Gerard simply chuckled at her childishness and gave her a small but warm hug.


	4. Replacement

**Chapter 4**

**Bella**

Bella was really starting to enjoy Gerard's company. He had been out cold for six days, but awake for far longer. During those days when Gerard was not bed-ridden, the two had become quite good friends, and Bella found that she missed the company of others more than she cared to admit. It was like the addition of Gerard's presence had alerted Bella to how alone she truly was.

"So, how long have I actually stayed here?" Gerard asked on his tenth conscious day at the mansion. Bella glanced at Cogsworth. He swirled his minute hand around until it landed on the two, and then he swirled it again until it reached the seven.

"About two weeks," Bella answered. Gerard almost spilled the mashed potato out of his mouth.

"Two weeks?" He cried.

"Well… yes," Bella said. "Are you ok?" She wanted to sound concerned, really she did. But the question came out as more of a growl. She was just worried about Gerard. And while he hadn't been like any of the others, her body automatically made her concern sound menacing.

"Bella, listen, it's been a pleasure meeting you here and getting to know you all; truly, it has, but I do have my son to think about. He's probably worried about me. I really must go,"

"Oh," Bella's ears flopped down to meet her skull. "Of course. Your son,"

"Really, it has been such a pleasure getting to know you-"

Suddenly Bella's ears perked up with an idea. A childish one, but Bella had been deprived of her childhood. She wanted to know how it felt to be one, if only for an hour.

"Before you leave, Gerard, could you do me a favor?"

Gerard seemed startled, but answered, "Of course, but what could I possibly do for you?"

Suddenly Bella felt self-conscious. Asking such an old man to play a game with her… But Gerard had been nothing but kind to her. She imagined that he would only chuckle and agree. She hoped, anyway. Her hope did nothing to stop her defense mechanism from growling out the request:

"Play hide and seek with me,"

Just as she predicted, Gerard chuckled a little before standing up from his nearly licked clean plate of warm mashed potatoes and a juicy cut of beef.

"Of course I will, dear. It'll do me good to move these old bones around a little,"

Bella tried to smile, but became painfully aware of her fangs as one of them poked at her bottom lip. She swallowed the smile and settled for whining happily instead.

Both of them stood up, and Bella decided that she would hide first. Gerard counted to one hundred as Bella rushed to find a spot big enough to accommodate her large body. She decided to hide in plain sight instead of trying to disguise her hulking body behind a sofa or somewhere equally as inadequate. So, she stood next to a wall full of fur heads and froze in a growling position.

As Gerard walked hurriedly through the room, Bella felt extraordinarily proud of herself. It was her pride that gave her away in the end, as she ended up whining excitedly as Gerard reached the doorway.

Quick as lightning he spun around and spotted her. She dropped her arms and playfully frowned at Gerard, who was laughing at her.

"Oh, you almost got me there, dear!"

Bella loved it whenever he called her dear. Her own father, even before she was a monster, had never called her such a lovely name. Simply Bella. Sometimes, if he was in a generous mood he would call out 'Daughter,' but those instances were few and far and in between. So, yes, she loved it whenever he called her dear. It made her feel wanted. Almost human again.

"Yes," Bella replied sadly. "_Almost_ got you,"

"Well, it is my turn now, dear. So, turn around and close your eyes. You know how to count to one hundred, yes?"

"Yes," Bella rumbled. "You better move fast, old man, I'll be coming to find you," with that, she turned around and started counting.

Gerard walked as quickly as he could away from Bella, and if it had been anyone other than Gerard, Bella would have been hurt. It seemed that everyone but Gerard and her staff were afraid of her. Before Gerard, she had tried to be kind to other humans. But they had always turned and fled, and in doing so, had always destroyed Bella inside.

One day, after another man ran away, she decided that enough was enough. Every time she met anything new, anything which could hurt her feelings, or make her feel less than she was, anything which scared her, she would growl and yell and do everything in her power to keep them from growing on her. That way, when they left, it wouldn't cut deep enough to wound her. Just enough to sting. It always stung.

"One hundred!" Bella roared. "Watch out, old man, I'm coming!"

So, Bella started looking. After searching everywhere in the south wing she was in, she searched the north wing, then the west, and even the east. She grew incredibly concerned and confused. Had he left her after all?

Her staff wouldn't tell her where Gerard was; only that he hadn't left the castle. Bella sat down on the stairs to the west wing and thought. She had searched everywhere in the castle except…

Bella leapt up to her feet. Of course! How could she have been so stupid! The dungeon!

She raced down the hall and to the left to the cold stone stairs that led down to the dungeon. Bella usually avoided coming down to the dungeon. The aging stairs always crumbled under her weight and the shadows which clung to the walls like a baby to its mother reminded her of her demonic form. She had destroyed most of the mirrors in the castle, and there was always enough light upstairs for her to avoid seeing her true form. But down in the darkness of the dungeon, it all became painfully visible.

Bella forgot all the reservations she had about going down to the dungeon when she heard Gerard yelling. She practically flew down the steps and skidded to a halt in front of a cell. She was on all fours and dust and bits of broken rock clung to her fur. She took one look at Gerard's situation and promptly laughed so hard that she almost fell over.

He was trying to hide inside of one of her cells, but the cell's door closed behind him, and he was stuck inside. She laughed until the laughs became groans and Gerard's cries of annoyance became sarcastic remarks of enjoyment.

"Yes, yes, Bella, keep the sick old man in the cellar. Good luck keeping this on your good conscious!"

"Alright, Gerard, alright, give me a-" Bella burst into another fit of giggles, which sounded quite odd as a beast, "-moment to find the keys,"

She staggered up the stairs to retrieve the keys, but came running back down when she heard more yelling. Not only of Gerard, but of another voice as well. What if someone was attacking him? He was old and defenseless and trapped.

Guilt swirled under her fur and Bella started panting as she loped to the dungeon stairs. On her way to the darkest space of her castle, Lumiere and Cogsworth leaped up from their spots on a bedside table and clung to the cape which billowed behind her. They struggled to help each other into her hood and stayed there, out of sight, as Bella descended down the stairs, on all fours this time. She stopped with a jerk. Her servants were thrown against her neck and a thick cloud of gray dust rose around her, but her gaze remained fixed on the person in front of her. The people in front of her.

One was familiar and comforting: Gerard. His nimble fingers were clinging to her dingy cellar's bars, his slightly protruding belly was pressed against those same bars. His round face was red. With fury or embarrassment, she did not know. What she also did not know was who the other person was.

He was male. His dark brown, almost black, hair was cut short, and pushed up and away from his face. His eyes were a beautiful chocolate. His shoulders were wide and his muscled chest could be seen fairly well through his white shirt. His brown vest was thrown into Gerard's cell. His fingers, too, were nimble and quick. She could tell because he was still tinkering as he looked to where the sound came from.

Yes, the sound. Bella had stopped herself before she entered the light. Her entire body was still bathed in the darkness, and for once, she was glad for the cloak of shadows around her. Her face heated up at the sight of the man in front of her. She had seen her fair share of men over the past few years, but this one way by far the best looking. She was suddenly glad for the fur which concealed her blush. She could hear Lumiere and Cogsworth behind her excitedly discussing her sudden raise of temperature.

"Who's there?" the young man called out. Even his voice was beautiful: deep and gravelly, but not so low that he didn't still remind her of an angel. With a start, Bella realized what a cruel world this was. Here she was, a beast, being beckoned to by the world's most beautiful man. "Show yourself, coward!" the young man continued, "Why did you imprison my father?"

"Now, Damian, this is enough!" Gerard tried to intervene, "The only reason I am here is because-"

"He chose his own fate," Bella growled from her corner of darkness, "The second he stepped in here, he was trapped,"

"And you were going to keep him here?" if this _Damian_ had a problem arguing with a growling shadow, he didn't show it. "My father is a very sick man, he could have died!"

"Damian, if you just let me explain-"

"Whatever beast did this to you does not deserve you coming to its defense, Dad," Damian snapped.

"Beast?" Bella growled. She could see Gerard's saddened face from the corner of her eye, but she was focused on Damian. He might have been beautiful on the outside, but inside, he was as cold and dark as the dungeon around them. "Beast!" she roared. Suddenly, Damian didn't look so brave. Bella chuckled darkly. "Not so brave now, are you, Damian?"

"How do you know my name?" His voice didn't tremble, but his eyes were wide, and with the little light provided in the cellar, reflected nothing but fear.

"I just said your name, son," Gerard explained tiredly.

"Son?" Bella asked, horrified. _This_ was the son Gerard was going back to? An animalistic rumble layered with her voice as she ground out, "You were leaving me for _this?_"

"Yes, he was leaving you for me! Step into the light, coward! What kind of parasite are you? Keeping an old man locked up because he requested some shelter?"

"Locked him up because he requested shelter?" Bella was yelling so loudly from the shadows that her voice was starting to screech. She didn't even know that her beast's body could allow her voice to do that. All she knew was that the man in front of her, yelling at her, was frightening. The only way to fight a frightening man was by being frightening herself. "I never turned him away! _Never_ let it be said that the Mistress of this castle does not house those looking for shelter,"

Her words went from being screeched and shouted, until the last part, which was growled out through ground teeth. The words left a bitter, acidic taste on her tongue. Bella could feel Lumiere and Cogsworth in her hood, shaking. Bella was truly close to real anger now. Gerard didn't know. It turned out to be a good thing he was his cell. He couldn't get out. But she couldn't get in, either.

"What would I have to do to get him out?"

Bella took a heaving breath, and she was sure that it sounded like a howl to Damian and Gerard. Both froze. Gerard started speaking,

"Bella, please, he's not usually like this-"

"Bella?" Damian asked his father, then he turned back to the shadow Bella was still hiding in, "So you kidnap innocent women as well? Step into the light, Beast,"

That was it. Bella snapped, and Lumiere and Cogsworth could feel it. Her muscles tensed. No longer were they trembling, like they usually did when she was afraid and simply let her defense mechanism wall up. No, now she was almost at the point of sincere fury.

Bella powerfully strode into the light, and Gerard gasped at the look in her eyes. He had seen her afraid. Gerard had been frightening. But not infuriating. For a split second, there was a fear so present in Damian's face, in quickened Bella's own heartbeat with apprehension and anxiety. But that moment was soon over and the harsh look was back in the young man's eyes.

"Please, Damian. This is the Mistress of the castle," Gerard tried to explain quickly, before his stubborn son cut him off again. Just hearing Gerard's weak and calming voice cooled down Bella's anger, and concern welled in her chest again. Lumiere and Cogsworth could feel her shoulders begin to shake again as Bella noticed Damian. "She took me in and cared for me and-"

"_She?_" Damian looked scandalized that his father could even bear calling the monstrosity in front of him a female. "_It,_" Damian emphasized, "locked you up! It doesn't care about your condition, Dad; get it in your stubborn old head!" Damian squared his shoulders and turned to Bella. Bella's trembling intensified. It might seem like her muscles shook from pure rage, but from the look on Gerard's face, Bella knew her eyes were as frightened as the dungeon was dark, as Damian was scary.

"I am the Mistress of this castle," Bella stepped forward. "No one steps onto my land or gets off without my knowledge or permission. How did you get here, _boy?_"

Damian glared at her and spat, "I owe you no explanation, Beasty,"

Bella outwardly snarled at the nickname, but inside, she was more than worried. If he wasn't frightened of her paws and claws and jaws, what could keep him from hurting her? Especially when he learned that she was so afraid of him? And he would learn it, if he truly was Gerard's son.

"Damian," Gerard's voice was getting hard, steely. "I've already told you-"

"Take me in his place," Damian interrupted.

"What?" both Gerard and Bella said at the same time. Bella was so shocked and confused that her defense slipped and instead of a growl, the question came out in her beast's rumbling, husky voice.

"Keep me prisoner, but let my father go," Damian's voice was strong, but Bella wasn't sure what to do. She let her composure slip further as she whined and grabbed her ears.

"Son," Gerard tried again, but Bella interrupted him.

"This is _your_ son?" Bella growled again, just to confirm. Damian took insult in the question and scowled,

"Am I not good enough for you, Beasty?"

"Take the offer, Mistress," Cogsworth whispered softly in her ear.

"Oui, Mademoiselle, you only have so much time left. Take the boy up on his offer,"

Lumiere and Cogsworth never agreed on anything. Bella would have to be a fool to not follow through with something both of them advised her to do.

"No," Bella resisted the urge to wring her paws. "No, the trade will happen. Let me get him out,"

So worked up was Bella that she didn't even need the keys in her paws. She pushed against the door with all her weight and put some power behind it, and soon there was no door, only the shadow of a large wolf-like beast on the floor of Gerard's cell. When she got close enough for Gerard to hear, but far enough that Damian couldn't, she whined,

"I'm sorry. He scared me. I didn't know what to do,"

"I know, Dear. Let me go home. Just send him back when you've taught him to listen to others a little more, huh?"

Bella reached down and picked Gerard up. He told her as she rushed him to the kitchen to she pack him a hot meal for the road that Damian had rode to her castle on the family horse. She told a couple of her servants to get the poor horse ready for another long ride, and another to grab Gerard a thick wool blanket. When he was set to go, Bella stood at the gate and howled as loud as she could. She waited until her sharp wolf-like ears could hear the retreating of frenzied and frightened wolves to let Gerard into the woods.

She slowly returned to her castle, sad that her first real human friend in about ten years had left her, as all the others had. But he had given her a new companion. And that horridly handsome man was still down in her dungeon.

Bella braced herself and gingerly made her way down the weak steps. She gasped when she saw him- he was sitting in the cell. The door was still on the floor from where she knocked it down. There were cracks on the concrete floor. Bella winced and reminded herself to be more aware of her unnatural beast strength.

Damian's head snapped up at the sound of her sharp intake of breath.

"What are you doing here?" he snapped.

"It is my castle. I go where I please. _You_ are a guest. If you stay here you will get sick and my reputation will be tarnished. You will not stay here," Bella growled out.

"Reputation? My death would tarnish it, but my father's would be nothing? Cruel, cruel Beasty, you are,"

A low rumbling sound came from deep in Bella's throat. She felt a ringing in her ears and she swallowed. Why was he so mean? Bella regained enough composure to not cry for the next two sentences:

"Cogsworth, take him to his room. Give him dinner, then keep him out of my sight,"

Then, Bella dragged herself back to her rampaged room. She sobbed quietly while Lumiere gave her the comforting glow of candle light to keep the shadows away from her while she slowly drifted off to sleep. She had one of the most restless nights she had had in years.


	5. Beasty and Crazy

**Chapter 5**

**Damian/Genevieve**

Damian had let the walking, talking clock lead him back to a beautiful room. It was definitely more lavish than what Damian was used to, but everything was at least ten years old, and the higher the furniture, the dustier it was.

"Is there anything else you require, Sir?" the surprisingly polite clock asked. Damian told him no and locked the door after Cogwsorth- that's what the clock said his name was- left.

Damian sat in his room for what seemed like hours. He remembered feeling annoyed with his father for the first two days he was gone. Then the feeling morphed into a tired resignation. If the old man wanted to be stubborn, Damian should let him. But then a week passed and Gerard was still gone. After ten days without his father, Damian went looking for him.

And when he finally found his father, he was sitting in a cell. No, not sitting- his old man was rotting in a dungeon while the beast, the 'Mistress' of the land, ate nothing but the best, and lived in nothing but finery. Damian growled and punched one of the pillows on his bed.

"Hello?" came the voice of the polite little clock. Damian felt a twang of sympathy for the little thing. It had nowhere to go, and its only option was to listen to its dreadful mistress. During the walk through the castle, Damian had noticed broken chairs and tables and mirrors scattered around like leaves on a windy autumn day. Now, he wondered if those poor furnishings had done something to upset their mistress, and that was the consequence. That certainly would explain the clock's extreme willingness to listen to the monster.

"Come in, the door is unlocked,"

"Well, uh," the clock coughed, embarrassed, then continued, "I cannot open the door just now, Sir. I am alone, so there is no one to help me reach the doorknob. As well as that, my arms are _quite_ full at the moment,"

Oh. Of course. He was just a clock. It was a wonder he had working arms at all. Damian walked over to the door and cautiously opened it. He glanced both directions for the monster before allowing Cogworth inside. When he did, Damian locked the door behind him.

"Here you are, Sir. A bowl of nice, warm vegetable broth with a few select cuts of only the finest meat. There is also a nice side of rice with it, in case you did not like bread,"

"Oh," Damian stared in wonder at the spread of food in front of him. His mouth watered at the smell of it. He had not had food this good since… ever. Lilith was a wonderful cook, but never did their family have enough spare money to allow her to cook this extravagantly. Damian's only problem with the food was that his father had not been able to taste it. "Oh, wow. This is all for me?"

"Yes, Sir. Unless of course, you would like me to take something out?"

"No!" Damian cried. His stomach grumbled with hunger. "I would be fine with bread, you know. I'm not sure I've ever had rice before,"

Cogworth chuckled.

"Gerard hadn't, either. He didn't exactly like it, either,"

"Gerard? As in, my father, Gerard?"

"Oh, yes. He didn't stay down in the dungeon the entire time he was here, you know," Cogworth chuckled again, except this time he did so nervously.

"He ate this type of food?" Damian couldn't get his head around it. How had his father been offered this type of food? Who had given it to him? It couldn't have been the beasty, could it?

Damian tried to shake the questions out of his head. He was his father's son, but the endless questions did get quite old after a while.

"Well, don't feel like a stranger, Sir. You are our guest, for now. Dig in!"

Damian didn't need any further encouragement. He started shoveling his food into his mouth, trying hard not to look too pathetic. He would be the first to admit that he was a terrible cook. So, he was extremely grateful for the well made food.

His stomach was full and warm in a matter of minutes. The clock waited patiently for him to finish, and when Damian set the plate down next to him, Cogsworth said,

"Very good, Sir. Now, it's been a very tiring day for you, I believe. Why don't you lay down and rest?"

Damian agreed quite quickly. He found that he was, indeed, more tired than he had ever remembered being. As soon as the little clock awkwardly picked up the plate and fork and left the room, Damian shucked off his shirt and jumped lightly onto the bed. At the feel of the soft sheets, the plush mattress, the warm comforter, Damian instantly fell into a deep sleep.

A knocking sound woke Damian up. His room was slightly lit up because of the rising sun, and birds were singing sweetly in the trees outside. He groaned slightly as he lifted himself up from the impossibly comfortable bed. He looked around the room, not fully understanding quite where he was. He wasn't used to being so warm in the morning. Or so at ease. Or so well fed. With a start, Damian realized that yesterday was not just a terrible dream. It was all real. He really was a beast's prisoner. Or, as Cogsworth had put it, a 'guest.'

Outside his door, it sounded like two people were arguing. Damian sighed and steeled his nerves to check who was behind it. He stood up and pulled on his shirt before opening the door a crack. It was just a candelabrum. Damian relaxed and swung the door open before promptly slamming it shut. There was the beasty, with its beasty face and beasty arms and beasty aura.

"See? I told you he was going to do this!" Damian could almost feel bad. If he didn't know the face behind the voice, he would have felt genuinely remorseful. But, he did, so he didn't. "I should have just stayed in my room. You can ask him yourself, Lumiere,"

"No, no, Mademoiselle! He just doesn't know you, oui? Give him a chance," Lumiere urged. The beasty sighed, and growled through the door,

"Would you like to come down to the dining room and have breakfast with me?"

"Breakfast _with _you?" Damian almost laughed, but then his voice hardened, "More like 'have me _be_ the breakfast.' No way in heaven or hell am I ever going to dine with you, Beasty,"

The beast and the candelabrum mumbled together outside of his door for a little while before she beast spoke clearly again, through the door,

"Would you please come down and have a nice breakfast of _eggs_ and _bread_ with me? No humans," the beast almost sounded… disgusted. At Damian's silence, the beast sighed and pleaded, "Please, you'll starve if you don't eat. And then what will I tell Gerard?"

Taking a second to compose himself, Damian huffed before snapping,

"My my, not a very intelligent Beasty, are you? I said I will not be coming down for breakfast! So, get it through your thick skull and leave me alone!"

Damian smirked as he heard the beast's hulking form stomp down the hallway. Then he smirked as he actually remembered what he was talking about. That… that monstrosity had the nerve to take his father's name? After looking the way it did, and doing the things it did?

While he tried his hardest to not show it, the creature's face scared him to no explainable level. It was the face of a wolf, and wolves were the reason his sister was dead.

The day his father had come back, bloody and shivering, Damian felt as though a part of him had been pulled out of his chest and cut into smithereens. His sister had always been there for him. She had provided for him, and loved him, and helped raise him. She was older by a full eight years, so she always had enough patience to deal with him.

For the first week after the attack, Damian had refused to believe that she was actually dead. But then a month passed, and she had still not come home. Two months, and a notice came from the castle she had worked at, inquiring about her health, wondering if everything was alright with her. Damian and Gerard had ridden two towns away to tell the Lord and Lady personally that Lilith had passed on. It was during that journey that the fact truly sunk into Damian's brain.

His sister was gone, and it was because of the damn wolves. He had made it his life's goal to avoid them at all costs, killing them any time he could. And now here he was, a guest to a giant, mutated one.

Damian growled under his breath and ran his hands through his hair as he paced across the room and back. He thought of his sister, what life was like before she had died. He thought of his mother, but he didn't really remember anything about her. When he thought of 'mother' the only face which came to mind was Lilith's. She had always been easy to talk to, and she had encouraged him to become who he was. He placed her above all the other women he knew.

A knock came at the door, and Damian snapped towards it.

"I told you," he said lowly at what was certain to be the Beasty. "I'm not eating with you. Ever,"

"What? No, no, no, Monsieur, it is only me!"

Curiously, Damian made his way to the door. He opened it a little, so that he could see who exactly was outside. When he saw the lonely candelabrum, Damian opened the door wider, so that he could fully see the little machine.

"Hello," Damian said, awkwardly. It was an inanimate object. Damian could not for the life of him understand how the little candle with a smiley face carved into its wax could speak. Cogsworth was an even more complex puzzle, he didn't even have a face drawn on him! No matter how much he wanted to figure out how they spoke, or seemed to have their own thoughts, Damian could not believe that he was speaking to furniture.

"Oui, Monsieur. May I come in?"

At least they were all polite. That was a plus.

"O-of course," Damian let the little candelabrum in. Before he could close the door, though, the walking and talking fire hazard called out,

"C'est bien! He let us in, so come on in!" and a whole dining room's worth of silverware, furniture, and decorations marched into Damian's room. After Damian closed the door and locked it- he couldn't be too careful with the beast in the castle- he walked back to his bed and sat on the edge.

"So, what brings you here?" Damian asked, hoping that the Beasty hadn't changed her mind and wanted to go back on their deal.

"We need to speak with you," a side table said. A group of cups were sitting on it, and they started jumping up and down, chanting,

"Give her a chance! Give her a chance!"

The dresser that had been in his room when he got there opened its doors and said,

"Yes, don't be too hard on her, she's just a little shy!"

A mob of household furnishings was yelling at him, and all Damian could do was watch. He had thought that after seeing the monster these things called a mistress, nothing could surprise him anymore. He was sorely mistaken. He didn't even understand what was happening anymore. Who were they talking about? Had he cursed to a sink and maybe hurt her feelings? A very shy sink? He simply wasn't sure.

"Hold on, quiet down! All of you, QUIET!" the candelabrum shushed. Then, he turned to Damian and said, "How rude of me. Forgive us, Monsieur. We haven't even introduced ourselves yet,"

Damian wasn't sure, but he thought that the candelabrum glared at the rest of the fixtures in the room. They all grumbled their apologies. Then, the candelabrum turned to Damian.

"Apology accepted," Damian assured.

"Still, we must introduce ourselves, no? I am Lumiere,"

"I am Claude," said the bedside table,"

"Dominique,"

"Charles,"

"Chip,"

"You can call me Mrs. Potts, honey,"

And on and on they went until all of the appliances had introduced themselves to Damian. He was sure he would never remember any of the names, but he was touched that they went through the trouble to do this for him. But, still…

"You didn't all come to see me just to introduce yourselves, right?" Damian crossed his arms. "Who do I need to give a second chance to?"

Lumiere looked at the young man, and Damian felt chills run down his spine. Those eyes carved into the wax were so soulless, but the voice coming from Lumiere was so real and lifelike, it was like a demon had possessed all of the objects, and Damian was pleasantly conversing with inhabitants of hell.

"You, Monsieur, have been very rude to our Mistress," Lumiere started, and Damian fought the urge to throw up at the thought of the monstrosity he had seen earlier. The way the wolf fur merged with the scales seemed so utterly unnatural and grotesque… Damian could hardly think about the Beasty without having to stifle the urge to spew the wonderful dinner he had received the day before.

"So what?" Damian said offhandedly. If candelabrum could look angry, Lumiere did.

"_So,_ she is our Mistress. She cares for us, watches out for us, and we love her. Before you judge her character based off of looks, you should learn what she is like in her heart,"

"Don't judge a book by its cover? Are you serious right now?"

"You are our guest, Monsieur. For that, we must insist you do what makes you comfortable, but if we could merely suggest not making our Mistress uncomfortable, or cry anymore, we would be very thankful,"

Then Claude wobbled to the locked door, where Mrs. Potts and some of her teacups unlocked and opened the door. The furnishings filed out of the room in a single file line. Lumiere was the last one left in the room, but Damian stopped him.

"Did your Mistress tell you to come here and say those things? You know she can't control you, right? In this room… you can say what you really want to," Damian couldn't help but to feel a little sympathy for the things under the Beasty's rule. Lumiere only sighed,

"We _did_ come here without Mistress's knowledge or approval. We _wanted_ to tell you those things. We _believe_ in everything we told you,"

And with that, Lumiere hopped away. Damian closed the door, stomach growling. He flopped onto the bed, heaving a great sigh. No matter what the Beasty's staff said, he couldn't believe that there was more to her than what he had already seen.

* * *

Genevieve couldn't believe it. She had been _so close_ to being married to Damian, but Louis had ruined everything! He just _had _to make her irritated and start yelling at him. No wonder Damian ran away, she had probably looked so ugly! But, Damian wasn't one to judge one's character on looks alone. Genevieve knew better than everyone.

Seeing Gerard, Damian's father, riding back to the village on his horse, Genevieve beamed. If Gerard was back, then Damian couldn't be far behind! She rushed over as much as she could in her dress to ask the elderly man about his handsome son's whereabouts.

"Mr. Labarre! Mr. Labarre!" Genevieve paused by Philippe to catch her breath, but quickly gasped out, "It's good to see you back, Mr. Labarre. How are you? Good? That's good. Where is Damien?"

Mr. Labarre looked completely lost for a second, and Genevieve quickly grew impatient. She had probably spoken too quickly for his aged ears to hear what she had said. She huffed, and was about to repeat herself when Mr. Labarre suddenly replied,

"Oh! Damian? Yes, he won't be back for a while. I went out to the woods, you know. While I was out there, I got lost," Genevieve was very close to losing her temper, but she took a breath to reign in the wild emotion. It was simply too unsightly. "I came across a castle somewhere in the middle of it. The Mistress there took us in- my she's a good girl. Anyway, when Damian came to fetch me, he insisted on staying there, and who am I to tell him what to do?"

Mr. Labarre seemed to grumble out the last part, but Genevieve wasn't paying attention to that. Damian was out in the woods somewhere in a castle with another girl? Why hadn't he come home? Was the other girl more beautiful than her? Did Damian love her more than he loved Genevieve?

"What does she look like?" Genevieve's tone was sharp and cold as ice.

"Hmm," Mr. Labarre said, "Her name is Bella. She's… beautiful on the inside. On the outside, she's an unsightly monster. She has the face, body, and legs of a wolf, with the back and tail of a lizard, and the paws of a bear. On her head, she has two strange horns, right by her ears. Such an odd little thing, she is,"

"What?" Genevieve all but screeched. There was no way her Damien left her for a monster, especially not one made mostly of wolf parts. Everyone knew how Lilith died. "You're crazy, old man,"

She took Philippe's reigns and lead him, with Mr. Labarre still riding atop him, to the pub. She knew that Monsieur D'Arque would be there.

She needed to know that Mr. Labarre was crazy. She needed that little bit of consolation. There was no way that Damien chose a demon over her. She just needed to wait. He just… went on a camping trip. Didn't he usually go on and on about getting out of the village? She just needed to give him time. Then, when he came back and said there was no other girl, then she could let Mr. Labarre out. Until then, he needed to be put into Monsieur D'Arque's asylum. There was just no avoiding it.


	6. The East Wing

**Chapter 6**

**Damian/Bella**

Damian woke up with an empty stomach. That was normal. Usually, he would attempt to make dinner, but he and his old man would find it too inedible and opt to just go to bed without any 'food' that Damian made.

But, this was new. For once, his bed didn't feel like it was made out of straw, or covered in a thick, itchy burlap material. That was because it wasn't. He wasn't at home. He was in an old, dusty castle in the middle of a wolf-infested forest, being kept as the Beasty's prisoner. Or, 'guest' as her staff loved emphasizing. Damian idly wondered if they were all 'guests' as well, or if they chose to remain where they were of their own free will. Did furniture even have free will?

Damian shook the thought from his head and stood up. He pulled on a shirt, but cringed at the smell. He had worn it in the woods for almost a week, not changing once, and now he was in the castle. To be blunt, the shirt reeked, but it was all he had.

He stood up and went to the bathroom the bedroom already had attached to it and washed his face. He looked at his reflection and scowled. He remembered what the Beasty looked like, and though he didn't want to admit it, the creature had terrified him out of his wits. But, it had seemed less threatening when he had glared back at it. Maybe it was like showing a wild animal that he wasn't one to be messed with? In case he ever ran into the monstrosity again, Damian would have to perfect his glare and scowl. That would probably tell it that he wasn't someone to be messed with.

After finding a satisfactory angry look, Damian carefully stepped out of his room. To his surprise, there was already a plate full of hot food in front of his room. He looked around to thank the servant who had sneaked the food out to him. There was nothing in sight, but he saw a shadow disappear behind a corner.

"Hey!" Damian called out, "Hey, wait!" He ran to follow the shadow. His father and sister had raised him to be courteous and thankful to anyone who did him a kindness, and Damian was not about to dishonor his sister's memory by failing to thank a table, or something of the like.

Damian kept trying to catch up to the shadow, but it kept evading him. For an inanimate object, it sure did run fast. A long hallway, a wall in the face, and a whole lot of twists and turns later, Damian found himself in front of his room again, food still there. He was about to give up and go in the room to eat his food, but he heard a _thump_, like the thing he had been chasing had bumped into a wall, and a small sound of pain.

Feeling victorious, Damian turned the corner, where his eyes widened in horror. There, in front of him, was the Beasty. It had a long purple cloak covering its disgusting body, but the hood was down. Before the Beasty had towered over him by at least two feet, but on the ground, it looked like a wounded puppy. A mutilated, slightly reptilian puppy. As soon as it saw Damian standing in front of it, the Beasty hurried to cover its face. It mumbled a hurried apology before standing up and trying to rush away.

"Wait," Damian called out. The Beasty froze and glared at Damian, growling lowly. What was he thinking? Damian scolded himself, this was a beast, there was no way he could thank it for the food. But was this vile creature worth dishonoring his sister? No. It was not. He took a deep breath and said, "Thank you," he pursed his lips together before finishing, "For the food,"

The Beasty's muscles trembled as it stared at him. Damian was unnerved by it's unbelievably human eyes. They were a startling gray, clouded by mystery, and misted over with misery. If not for those eyes, Damian would have been certain that the Beasty wanted to eat him. But those terrifyingly human eyes didn't convey hunger, or anger for that matter. It was… afraid?

"You're welcome," the Beasty replied softly, its gravelly voice strangely soothing. Before Damian could turn back to eat his breakfast, something went whizzing by him and the Beasty.

Damian, like any normal scared human being, jumped and cried out in alarm. The Beasty, though… it certainly was a mystery. As soon as the object streaked by it, its fangs were bared, hair raised, and it started growling. It glared in the general direction that the thing went, and that was the moment Damian started questioning it. His mind whirled with thoughts and possible reasons for the Beasty's irrational growling. That menacing, terrifying reaction… was that only reserved for when it was afraid? Did that mean that the Beasty was afraid of… him?

"So sorry, Mademoiselle," Lumiere came out of nowhere and apologized. "We were having some fun, you see, and-"

"We were having so much fun! Where did Coggy go?" Chip interrupted, hopping up to the beast from behind Lumiere. The Beasty chuckled and pointed in the direction the blur of brown had headed. Neither the Beasty nor Damian bothered to stop the two as they hopped after their fellow staff member. Damian didn't even want to know how they got the clock to agree to play with them, let alone go flying through the halls. Or, did the clock even go voluntarily in the first place?

Damian took in the new expression on the Beasty's face. Fur ran along its face's contours and dips. Its eyes were calm and sparkling. It wasn't smiling, but wasn't growling, either. So, the Beasty could act more or less like a human. Damian debated mentally whether he should go ahead with his plan. If he was right, and Beasty did have emotions, then he could get an explanation for the treatment of his father. If he was wrong… he might as well be dead anyway, locked away in a castle in the middle of the woods for the rest of his life. Before he could talk himself out of it, Damian demanded,

"Why did you lock my father in your dungeon?" to make sure that Beasty wouldn't try to scare him, Damian carefully placed the scowl and glare he had been working on in the bathroom on his face. Beasty started growling,

"What did you say?" its muscles started trembling, and it took everything in Damian to not spin on his heels and book it back to his room.

"My father, Gerard Labarre. Why do I get such good treatment, when he was forced into a cellar in the dungeon? Don't you know? He's old, he's sick, he could've died!" Damian's anger fueled his yelling. Beasty screeched right back,

"I never would have let that happen!"

"Oh, yeah right, like I believe that!"

"I don't care if you believe me or not, I am telling you that I would have never allowed that to happen, not under my roof!"

"What were you going to do with him, anyway? I'm sure he would have been fit to travel days ago! Why were you keeping him in your God-forsaken castle!"

Beasty's trembling muscles became more noticeable as it retorted,

"I wasn't going to do anything! I was caring for him! Giving him food, making sure he was comfortable, speaking to him! I make my guests comfortable," the last sentence was spoken with a certain bitterness which Damian would have noticed had he not been so worked up.

"'Make your guests comfortable?' As if I could believe you! I bet you were going to fatten him up, then eat him! You, Beasty, _truly are a monster!_" Beasty didn't even grace him with an answer, it just screeched into the air as its claws started pulling at some of its hair. Damian continued, "Where is your lair, tyrant? In that precious east wing of yours?"

"Don't you go there," Beasty growled at him. Damian scoffed and turned to go back to his room. He scooped up the food, still in front of his door, but paused before he closed the door. Just to make sure it knew that he was thankful for the food, he called out, almost sarcastically,

"Many thanks for the food, Beasty!"

"Stay out of my east wing!" was its only response.

After a disappointingly cold breakfast, Damian crept out of his room once again, except this time, he knew exactly where he was going. He was going to find out what would have happened to his father, what would eventually happen to him if he stayed. He was going to find out exactly how much of a monster Beasty was. The only way to do that was to go to the one place Beasty had forbidden him from going. Damian was going to satisfy his inner scientist, and his inner boy. He was going to get answers. He was going to get in trouble.

Damian was going to the east wing.

It was surprisingly easy to get there. He simply needed to navigate his way through the maze of halls until he reached the main entryway, where the front door led. Then he climbed the stairs and went left: east.

The hallway started out like the rest of the castle looked: the walls were a dull dark purple, the floor a cold stone. There were a few pictures on the wall, but most of them were ripped to shreds. Did Beasty destroy everything it touched?

As he kept going, Damian came across a few splintered chairs, a few broken tables, and almost a dozen shattered mirrors with what looked and smelled like dried blood coated on the sharper edges of the broken shards.

_It's ashamed_ Damian realized after a few moments of pondering. _Beasty is ashamed of its own reflection! _

The walls started darkening, and Damian had to carefully inspect the walls and corners, to make sure nothing was there, waiting to ambush him. Even with him being so cautious, Damian could swear something was following him. When he turned to look, though, there was nothing there but ripped wallpaper and broken furniture. There seemed to be voices in the silence, and they were all telling him to turn back, but Damian ignored them. He needed to see. What was Beasty hiding here that was so special? He needed to know if he was going to die.

After walking down the dreary hallway for entirely too long, Damian came across a set of extravagantly decorated double doors.

_Of course, _Damian thought bitterly _The Mistress needs to have the best. _

Steeling his nerves, Damian pushed the heavy doors open, and walked in. He was both in awe and unimpressed by the interior of the Mistress's room. The room itself was large, with a small personal balcony with a beautiful view of the forest, but it was what was done with the space which left something to be desired.

The walls were coated in light purple-gray paint, which set an eerie atmosphere in the room. The bed was shoved against a wall, the mattress lying in tatters, leaning against the actual bed frame. Sheets and comforters littered the ground, and there were splotches of blood every couple of feet, giving the room a stale stench.

Damian wrinkled his nose as he stepped further into Beasty's world. Not paying attention to where he placed his feet, Damian stepped on something small. Trying his hardest to not actually break anything in Beasty's room, Damian moved to the right. In doing so, he knocked over a shredded painting. Determined not to become completely flustered, Damian jumped to catch the falling masterpiece.

He caught it, thankfully, but as it turned out, it wouldn't have made much of a difference if he had let it drop. The painting used to be of a small girl, if he were to guess, but who, he couldn't guess. The eight large slashes on the girl's face made it impossible to truly tell what she looked like.

Figuring that he had time before Beasty came back, Damian carefully folded the flaps of shredded cloth back in place. When all of the pieces were correctly placed back, Damian had to stop himself from staring too long.

Even though the girl could have been no older than thirteen, and pieces of her face were missing thanks to the ripped canvas, the girl was obviously beautiful, with dark chocolate waves tumbling over her shoulders, a straight nose, and pleasantly plump pink lips. What really captured Damian's attention, however, were her eyes. They were a deep gray, shrouded in mystery and loneliness. They were disturbingly like Beasty's eyes. With a sudden chill creeping down his spine, Damian realized that Beasty had probably killed this girl and stolen her eyes, using them as her own.

With that morbid thought jerking Damian out of his stupor from staring at the portrait, he placed the painting back where he found it and went around the room, looking for any form of evidence to convince him that Beasty was hiding something. Human hands, human eyes, human corpses. Anything, really, would have helped. He just needed a reason to get out without breaking his vow with Beasty. Even though it was a beast, Damian was a man of his word. Unless he truly thought that Beasty was a threat to his life, Damian would stay in the castle as Beasty's 'guest.'

Damian kept looking for a second longer, but a flash of color caught his attention. In the middle of Beasty's ghastly room was a rose. It was without a doubt the most beautiful rose Damian had ever seen in his life. The petals were ripe red, full of life and the hope of being just as beautiful tomorrow. The rose gloated its radiance from the middle of a glass container, and it glowed with an ethereal light. Entranced completely, Damian lifted the glass cover off of the rose, feeling inexplicably drawn to the beautiful flower. He had the urge to touch the velvet petals, smell its sweet scent, feel the soft of the rose while being surrounded by the harshness of Beasty's castle.

"What do you think you're doing here?" a monstrous voice growled out. Out of the shadows leapt Beasty, gray eyes flashing with a dangerous light.

"U-uh," Damian stuttered, scrambling backwards to get away from Beasty. He had seen it angry before, when he had met it in the dungeon, but there was something different about the rage he could physically feel radiating out from the monster now. It was primal, insane. Damian could feel the prickling cold sensation of sweat on the back of his neck as his breathing quickened. The primal part of his brain, concerned solely with survival, urged Damian to run. But Damian couldn't react to the uneasy feeling in his gut. He froze, frightened, in front of the Beasty, heart pumping ice into his body at the realization that he had been caught, and at the anticipation of what was to happen.

Beasty snatched the glass cover out of Damian's hands before covering the rose with the case with more care than Damian thought Beasty could possibly possess. With a soft clicking sound, the rose was once again trapped behind the case, and Damian couldn't help but feel that the sad look Beasty adopted when looking at the covered rose wasn't for the plant.

Beasty slowly turned and glared at Damian. It crept to him on all fours, keeping mainly in the shadows, so that only its piercing eyes were visible. It growled louder as it whirled around him, asking again,

"What are you doing here?"

Unlike before, in the dungeon, Beasty wasn't yelling. The words hit Damian with a cold fury, and Damian shivered.

"I-I just wanted to-"

"You disobeyed the one order I gave you," Besty's cool façade escaped it for a second, and it screamed out 'one' before mellowing out for the rest of the sentence. It kept speaking, faster and faster, moving towards Damian all the while. "I gave you food, a place to sleep, I kept your father safe, well fed. All I asked was that you leave our hope in peace!

"You have no idea what you could have done, foolish boy," Damian was progressively moving backwards, but his back hit the bed frame. Beasty towered above him, on its two hind paws now. Damian was trapped, and Beasty was angry.

"I haven't done a thing!" Damian tried to protest. He hadn't broken anything- not really. The one thing he knocked over- the painting- he had set back to its rightful place. There was absolutely no reason for the monster to be so upset. Beasty's powerful tail whipped somewhere to the left and a soft thud was heard, not that Damian paid it much attention.

"You could have ruined everything!" Beasty screeched the last word, roaring in Damian's ears. But, Damian wasn't scared anymore; he was angry. He hadn't done anything! Why was Beasty so angry?

"I _could_ have? I didn't! You, Beasty, are a cruel Mistress, indeed, getting so angry at what could have happened,"

Beasty roared and smashed the bed frame not half of a foot from where Damian was standing. He flinched and subtly stepped towards the door.

"I suppose you weren't planning on touching the rose? I suppose you weren't about to trap us here like this forever? I suppose you didn't come to the east wing when the Mistress of the castle specifically told you not to?"

The pure fury in Beasty's eyes and icy tone chilled Damian to the bone. However, the heat from his rage almost immediately melted the fear from Damian's core.

"Beasty, you stupid, stupid creature, it's just a rose!" Damian yelled, too angry and not afraid enough of the thing in front of him to stay silent any longer. Beasty bristled and screamed so loudly that Damian was surprised his ears weren't bleeding,

"GET OOOUUUT!"

When Damian didn't move, it grabbed one of the splintered wood planks from the destroyed bed frame and threw it at him. Had he fallen to the ground a second later than he did, the chunk would have hit him straight in the face. Beasty came running at him, blood-lust in its eyes. Damian scrambled to his feet and fumbled for the door. Beasty growled behind him, but Damian got out of the door first, falling the the ground as he slammed the door behind him. Ears ringing, Damian took a split second to try to absorb what had just happened before heard a thump from the other side of the door he was resting against. Damian's heart stopped before he jumped up and ran.

* * *

Bella panted heavily, not used to getting so aggravated. She slapped her heavy tail on the stone floor a few times to get rid of some of the frustration and anger still inside of her while she paced. She had never felt that much raw fury before, not even after she had been turned into the monster she currently was. She started thinking, and her pacing slowed, then ceased. It wasn't really Damian's fault, was it? Of course, if she told him not to go somewhere he would immediately want to go there. It's not as if he was purposefully trying to make sure that she and her staff never had any chance of becoming human again. No one had told him of the curse.

It was just the thought of him being the cause of her staff being forced to remain various castle appliances and furniture for the remainder of their lives which set Bella on edge. She thought of Chip, who had only been a small child when he had turned. He had never even truly known what it was like to be a human. He probably didn't even remember what it was like to be embraced by another human, to feel their warmth try to soothe away the hurt or pain. He couldn't possibly remember what it was like to run and play and stretch his legs, as only a human body can do. If Chip _never_ got to know who he should have been… Bella didn't think she could forgive herself. But, she also wouldn't be able to forgive herself for acting so… _monstrously_ towards her guest and not apologizing.

So, with her pride left years behind her, Bella left the fearsome atmosphere of her room and went to ask about Damian's whereabouts.

"He ran out, Mademoiselle," Lumiere answered nervously. "We all could hear you getting angry at the poor boy. What could he have possibly-"

"Wait, Lumiere, did he leave the castle? With his horse?"

"Why, yes, Mademoiselle, but why is this such a big-"

"There are wolves out there, Lumiere!" Bella cried, worried for her friend's son. She couldn't in good conscious leave him out there with the wolves when she could be out there, protecting him. If she had to tell Gerard that his only remaining child had died, and the jaws of wolves, no less, Bella knew that she would not be able to live with herself. Especially since she had the power to save Damian. Bella stepped over her faithful candelabrum and started running, down on all fours, to the woods.

She huffed as she sprinted up and down the slopes, trying to find Damian's trail, but it was just so difficult. The only reason she found him was because of the wolves, howling and yipping excitedly at the prospect of their next meal.

She howled loudly as she neared them, and the yips were replaced by growls, angry barks, and a few fearful whimpers. Bella skidded to a stop in between Damian, still atop his horse, and the pack of hungry wolves. In response to their growls and barks, Bella snarled right back at them, keeping her back to Damian, and her face to the pack. Her tail was out and poised, ready to hit any of the animals back if they tried to get to Gerard's son. As she stood there, poised for attack, Bella realized just how comfortable she was in her beastly body. And she realized how much she hated herself for accepting the form she was currently in.

Damian's horse's reigns were tangled on a tree branch, and Bella couldn't find it in her heart to leave the animal to the mercy of the wolves. After all, it had been a faithful companion to both Gerard and Damian. Such a creature deserved some compassion. The only way to save the horse and Damian was to fight the wolves. If that was what she needed to do, then Bella would do just that.

"Beasty?" Damian mumbled before losing consciousness. Bella ignored him. She snapped at the largest wolf, and all the others moved towards her. She pushed two of them back with her tail, and killed one right away by crushing its jugular. She bit one on the snout and threw another back. It slumped at the foot of a tree and didn't get up again.

At the horse's whiny, Bella whirled to protect him and his rider. She hit back another wolf as two attached themselves onto her back. One of them bit into her ear, and Bella roared in pain. She ripped it off of her and threw it away. Another couple ganged up on her and took turned biting and slashing at her until she hit both of them away.

After much more fighting than she would have liked to do, Bella had scared all of the wolves off. She led the horse back to her castle slowly, limping the entire way, and leaving a clear trail of blood behind her.

* * *

Damian woke with a groan. His entire body ached, like he had fallen asleep in an awkward position. He had a crick in his neck, and his sides were tender. His arms were numb, and his legs felt sore, as if Damian hadn't stretched them for too long.

"Sir? How are you feeling?" Cogsworth asked him.

Damian groaned again. Great. He was still at the castle. He didn't remember how, though. The only memories in his mind were Beasty yelling at him to get out, tacking up Philippe faster than he ever had before, and riding into the woods. But then… there were wolves. And for a few terrible minutes, Damian was sure he was about to die in the same way as his sister did. The irony was lost on him. Philippe's reigns had somehow ripped themselves from Damian's grip and gotten tangled in a tree's branch, too high for Damian to reach. Then… Beasty itself had arrived. That was the point when the shock and terror had taken hold of Damian, and he had fainted.

"Mistress, I must insist that you stop doing that," a soft voice said.

"Oui, Mademoiselle, we could do so much of a better job than what you are doing,"

"You're going to get those infected, Ma'am," Cogsworth jumped down from his position on the couch Damian was resting on to nag his Mistress. Damian pushed himself off the bed to see what all the ruckus was about, ignoring the stiffness in his joints. His eyes widened at the sight in front of him.

There he was, complaining about sleeping in an awkward position, while Beasty sat there, licking at the multiple bleeding wounds all over its body.

"Mademoiselle," Lumiere sighed, pushing some cloth and a bowl of water closer to his Mistress, "Please, stop this. You will never get better if you keep doing this,"

"This is what beasts do, Lumiere," Beasty said, almost bitterly, "Let me resign myself to this fate,"

"Never, Ma'am," Cogsworth interrupted. "You are more than this. Please, let us help you,"

Damian examined all of the wounds on Beasty's body. They were all at least an inch deep, and were all varying degrees of scratches and bites. _From the wolves_ he realized. _It fought them off for me._

Damian looked down again. Not a scratch on his body. Feeling pity for the monster in front of him, Damian ran his hands through his hair, regaining feeling in his extremities, and said,

"Here, let me,"

Damian could feel the staff's cautious looks. He had no idea why they were looking at him like _he_ was a threat when they should be more wary around their 'Mistress'. Damian just sighed and dipped some of the cloth into the bowl of water set in front of Beasty. He tried to set it on Beasty's arm, but at the last second, it moved its arm. Looking reproachfully at Beasty, Damian tried again to set the cloth on Beasty's arm, but Beasty whined and moved its arm again. Damian sighed and said,

"What's wrong?"

"What if it hurts?" Beasty whined. Damian just stared for a second.

"Of course it's going to hurt. But that's the only way you'll get better. Now, be a good Beasty and let me help you,"

"Stop calling me Beasty," the beast sounded defeated, as if it didn't believe it could convince Damian to change his mind about its name. Damian placed the cloth on the beast's arm, and it screamed. Ears ringing, Damian started rubbing the wound softly, trying to clean it.

"Well, what should I call you then?" Damian asked, not expecting the beast to have its own name. The beast looked shocked that he even thought of calling it anything but Beasty.

"My name," the beast said, as if it was obvious. Damian dipped the cloth into the water again and moved onto another wound. This time the beast didn't roar, instead letting out a long whine and tensed its muscles, claws digging into the arm of the chair it sat on. Damian was glad it had enough self-control to only damage the chair, and not lash out at him instead.

"And what might that be?" Damian asked. He hated touching the beast. He tried his hardest to not let himself look into its face. Touching paws like the ones which wanted to rip him to shreds what felt like moments ago was unbelievably unappealing to him.

"My name is Bella," the beast whimpered. Damian stopped cleaning the beast- Bella's- wounds for a second. Why did that sound so familiar? Damian slowly kept working, mind wondering why 'Bella' was such a familiar name.

"My father called you this?" Damian asked, finally remembering his father calling her Bella while he was in the dungeon, locked in a cell.

"Yes," The beast said happily. "He is a very nice person. My only friend,"

"You were friends," Damian said, his voice strained as he tried desperately to keep his temper in check; this beast had just saved his life. But it was so difficult to stay calm when it said things like this.

"Yes. We were playing hide and seek before he went back to his village. He said you would be worrying about him. I convinced him to stay long enough to play a game with me, but then you showed up and…" Bella trailed off. Her ears, which had slowly been drifting skyward, snapped back to connect with her skull.

Damian was tempted to accept Beasty's explanation- so much would be made clear because of it. But, no. He couldn't. Too much was still a mystery to him; there were still too many unanswered questions. Why hadn't the old man told him when Damian had told him he was going to break him out? Why hadn't his father asked to go home earlier, if the old man was so worried about him? Why were they playing hide and seek in the first place?

Pondering the questions, Damian kept washing the wounds, casually telling Bella to stop licking her wounds every time she tried to do so, thinking that he wouldn't notice.

Before that night, Damian had not thought that a pouting Beasty could be compared to a puppy who didn't get what it wanted. He found it surprisingly endearing. More endearing that the snarling, rabid Beasty he had seen not half a day ago. Maybe, if Bella started liking him as much as she liked his father, he would be allowed to leave. Or at least maybe she would stop snarling and growling and just generally scaring him so much.

After about an hour and a half of cleaning and bandaging the various wounds all over her body, Damian stood up, cracking his back. Before he retired to his room, Bella said,

"Wait!" she struggled to stand, and Damian watched proudly as all of his wrappings stayed in place. "Please listen: I'm sorry,"

"What?"

"For earlier, when I yelled at you, I'm sorry. That wasn't entirely your fault, and I can see that now. Please, forgive me?"

The beast had a slight whine behind her words, and she nervously wrung her paws in front of her body. Her eyes, as disturbingly humanoid as they were, pulled at Damian's heartstrings, and Damian found himself saying,

"You're forgiven. Just never do it again,"

On his way back to his room, Damian mentally screamed at himself- what was he thinking? Why would he forgive such a ruthless, vile creature? Even if it saved his life, it had locked up his father, and tried to attack him in the east wing! So why was Damian being so forgiving?

Damian sighed to himself as he rid himself of his shirt and settled into his bed for the night. He would tell himself that he forgave her because that was who he was inside- he was a forgiving person.

But deep down, he knew. Those clouded eyes had become clear for a moment. The gray had gone from menacing storm clouds to a soft ocean swell. Inside of her soul, Bella was a vulnerable, scared monster who had one friend in the world- his father. And for some reason, he found that he couldn't fault her for wanting to keep his old man close to her.

Also, saving his life hadn't exactly made it hard for him to give her a little bit of grudging leeway.

Damian settled down, trying to let the goose down comforter soothe away the strains of the day. He forgave the beast because she let him stay in her house. He forgave her because she gave him a nice place to sleep and warm, delicious food. He certainly did not forgive her because she looked like an adorable puppy when she looked at him, pleading her apology with the most honest voice and open eyes he had ever witnessed. Certainly not.


	7. Reading

**Chapter 7**

**Genevieve/Damian/Bella**

Genevieve paced in front of the fireplace in the town pub, wringing her hands and occasionally pulling at her silky hair. At that moment, she was on her break, but she would have to go back to work soon. While the Thorten triplets were good girls- very pretty and sweet- the men who came to the pub to drink mainly requested Genevieve. Of course they would. While pretty and sweet was fine for those day-time gals, Genevieve was a little more than that. She was gorgeous.

Her face was round and soft, full of all the curves a woman wished for, but still had defined cheekbones, and no extra fat under her chin or neck. Her eyes were naturally wide, and colored with an alluring sky blue. Her lips were full and red, and men stared whenever she drank, or pouted, or spoke. Her neck was long and led down to her thin shoulders, and curvy body. Her hair was golden enough to make angels jealous, and her voice was soft and soothing. Her skin was soft and creamy, and she always went to painful lengths to make sure that there was no extra plump where men would find it unattractive.

All in all, there was not a blemish on Genevieve. While it made women jealous of her and men lust after her, Genevieve was never happy with that. She wanted people to love her, of course, but she wanted them to love her for _her_. For Genevieve, not the barmaid with a lustful body and rich father. The only person who had ever even tried to get to know her on a personal level was Damian. And now, he was off in the woods, cozying up to some strange woman!

In a flash of anger Genevieve swung her arm around, hitting a big beer mug to the ground. She watched as the clear shards were cleared away by Abigail Thorten and sighed.

She had been in that exact same position the first time Damian had spoken to her. This was years ago, of course. Before she had gotten beautiful. Back then, her hair was darker, and stringier. It was like a mouse's, and her face was still very much filled with baby fat. She wasn't as tall as she was now, and her voice still cracked. Her body wasn't nearly as developed, and she still wore her father's slacks and shirts, so whatever figure she did have was hidden behind burlap and cotton. She had been sick often, and with the way she looked, most men made sure to steer clear of her, other than her father.

_Someone had just dropped a beer mug. Sighing to herself, a younger Genevieve went on all fours to clean it up._

_"Are you alright?" a tenor voice asked her._

_Startled, Genevieve stood up quickly, accidentally cutting herself with a sliver of glass._

_"Ah!" she exclaimed, holding her hand to her chest._

_"Oh, sorry," the voice apologized. Genevieve looked up, wondering who would be so nice to a bar maid. The person who her gaze fell upon left her breathless._

_His hair had been lighter back then, but it was just as short. The wavy brown locks fell in a well-placed mop around his eyes, as this was before he had started wearing it up. His chocolate eyes sparkled with a quiet intelligence, with an underlying color of concern. His jaw was defined and angular, his hands large and rough looking, his body perfectly proportional and symmetrical. He was the most handsome man Genevieve had ever seen, and, working at a pub, she had seen quite a lot of men._

_"Hello," she said softly, fearing that if she spoke too loudly the beauty would turn away from her._

_"Hello," he smiled, but then it melted off his face, and Genevieve's heart dropped. Did he stop smiling because of her? He reached out and took her bleeding hand. "Are you alright?" he asked, looking directly into her eyes._

_"Well, I'll wrap it up after I finish cleaning up," Genevieve didn't want to lie to the man in front of her. He had been so nice to her; the least she could do was be honest with him._

_"Then I'll help you clean up, and I'll wrap it up for you,"_

_"You really don't need to-"_

_"It's not a problem," he interrupted. "It would be my pleasure, actually. Better than hanging out with them, anyway," the man had said, jerking his head towards the table of rowdy drunks. Genevieve let out a small giggle. The man had smiled, and Genevieve vowed to giggle more often if it made the man smile._

_"I'm Genevieve Fleour," Genevieve had said shyly._

_"And I'm Damian. Damian Labarre,"_

Genevieve had thought that a beautiful man deserved a beautiful bride. From that day on she had set her mind to looking her best, and soon she was the prettiest girl in town. She had imagined being married to Damian, having beautiful children with Damian, growing old with an eternally beautiful Damian.

But now, Damian was somewhere in the woods at the start of winter, when it was too cold for her to go looking for him. Worse, he was apparently with another woman.

Damian was the only man who had ever tried to get to know Genevieve. He had showed interest in her likes, her dislikes, her personality. He had talked to her and helped her before she was beautiful, and she loved him for that. He was the only man in town who had not once tried to get up her skirt, because he was a beautiful gentleman. He was _her_ gentleman. Only, he had not gotten the memo. He had gone off and now he was with another.

Genevieve growled quite unappealingly as she went back to work, scrubbing the bar counter as if it were the other girl's face. She scrubbed and scrubbed until her elbow started aching, and then she kept going. No one was going to take Damian away from her. _No one._

* * *

Damian hadn't meant to barge in on her. It was honestly a mistake. He had only been exploring when he had stumbled across the room. The doors had been the best kept he had seen in the entire castle, and they weren't even in the east wing. Damian had figured that he could simply go inside, and Beasty- Bella- would have no right to be angry. So, he had heaved the heavy door open and stepped inside.

The room was huge. There were four large windows on one wall, each stretching from the floor to the ceiling, letting in enough light to make Damian wonder if they weren't outside. There was a small fireplace in the corner, with many plush couches and chairs surrounding it. There was a soft rhythmic squeaking sound coming from somewhere in the room, but Damian was only focused on the contents of the room. There were at least ten large columns of book cases, each stretching from ten feet in front of Damian to the back of the room. Damian wasn't sure, but he would have bet that this was Beasty's -Bella's- personal library. Damian took another step into the room, taking a closer look around.

That was the cleanest room in the castle, it seemed. Even back at home, François's book store had not been this clean. Every square inch of the floor was spotless. The wood book cases were gleaming, and the couches had not a speck of dust on them.

And yet, the room was still comfortable- not too clean to seem cold and uninviting. The warmth from the fire and the regular squeaking gave Damian a warm fuzzy feeling inside. He inhaled a deep breath of the air inside, and a nostalgic longing filled his chest. It smelled of old paper and bread, just like François's store.

Damian walked back to his room and grabbed the book meant for his sister. If he couldn't mark her grave with it, he thought that she would have wanted the book to rest in a place like this. After all, this was her favorite book, and she always treated books with respect. What greater respect could Damian give a book than letting it rest in a place as well-kept as that library?

Damian closed the door behind him and started walking towards one of the book cases, but froze when he heard a whine coming from near the fireplace.

He slowly eased his way towards the sound, noticing that the squeaking sound got louder the closer he got to the long burgundy couch five feet away from the fireplace. When he finally saw what was making the noises, Damian froze, book clutched tightly in his hands.

It was Beas-Bella. She was curled into a tight ball on the far corner of the couch, furry head near her hind legs, reptilian tail wrapped around her whole form, wolfish snout tucked into a carefully handled book. He wasn't sure exactly what she was doing with her mouth until he cautiously ventured a little closer. He nearly let out a bark of laughter. She was _mouthing_ the words she was reading.

Damian stayed still a little longer, waiting to see what she would do when she noticed his presence. But she never did. She just stayed in her ball, rocking back and forth in time with her reading. She took one of the thin pages between her impressive claws and delicately turned the page, smoothing it down lovingly before she continued reading.

Damian watched, transfixed, as the beast in front of him read. He couldn't read, he was a simple village boy. His mother, also town native, obviously hadn't learned to read, either. His father, however, had come from a larger town, and had therefore learned how to read before moving to the village to marry Damian's mother.

The only reason his sister knew how to read was because she had worked as a seamstress in a castle of Poitiers. She had met a librarian, and whenever she had a day off, he had taught her how to read. Lilith had immediately fallen in love with the first book she read on her own, and with the man who had enough faith in her to teach her how to read it. Damian had been the first to hear about her accomplishment of reading the book on her own, and of her engagement. The two never had the chance to get married, as fate had it.

Beasty started growling, and Damian worried that his presence had been noticed, and had been found intrusive. Damian tensed, prepared to run, until he noticed that she wasn't growling at _him,_ she was growling at the book.

Her ears were so flat against her head that he couldn't even see them anymore. Damian watched, confused, as she hesitated to turn the page. She finally decided that she had to, but her growls grew louder as she started mouthing more words, and faster. Her eyes were wild, and low beneath her growl was a whine. Once again, Damian wondered if Beasty-Bella's growls truly meant that she was angry, or if it meant something else.

Damian stayed a while longer, watching in wonder as Bella read her book, wondering. If she- a beastly hybrid of wolf, reptile, and devil- could read, why couldn't he? He wondered, she seemed so passionate about her reading, would she consider teaching him how to read? The only way to know for sure would be to ask… but did he want to risk her anger? Maybe he could offer her something in return. All he had with him was the book in his hands- _It Happened at Midnight_. Would she take that as fair trade? A single book, when she had an entire library full, in exchange for countless hours spent to teach him how to read?

A soft thump and the lack of a squeaking sound alerted Damian that Bella was done with her book. Not giving himself enough time to decide he was too afraid, Damian marched over to Bella and shakily held the book out to her hulking form, still curled on the couch. She looked up at him curiously, then down at the book, and froze.

* * *

Bella couldn't believe what she was seeing. She had simply been reading, getting lost in the setting and story of the book in her hands. She had meant to only read to chapter twenty, but when she got to chapter nineteen, they had uncovered the murderer's plot, and she simply could not stop until she knew whether Prince Stephen and Corinne would be safe or not. So, she had kept going, and when she had finished the book, Damian had marched up to her and held out a book she hadn't seen in about three years.

_It Happened at Midnight_ was her favorite book, it always had been. It wasn't the first book she had ever read, not by any means, but it had been the first book she had read after turning into a beast. It was the one book which had always filled her with hope, which assured her that there was something better waiting for her in the darkness she was living in.

Before Chip borrowed it and accidentally burnt it to a crisp, Bella used to read the book at least once a month. But since Chip had dropped it in the fireplace, and beasts such as herself didn't have much opportunity to go to the local bookstore and buy a new copy, Bella had had to rely on memory to remind herself of the story, the message, the writing style. She loved it all. But, there was Damian, a new copy in his shaking hands, holding it out to her.

Before Bella had a chance to think about what she was doing, she reached out to grab it from him. But then, reason wormed its way into her brain, and she recoiled, as if the book was on fire.

She could feel her ears flatten against her skull as she started growling. What if Gerard's son only brought her the book to cause her pain? What if he wanted to hurt her, like she had almost hurt him a couple of days ago? What if he wanted to let her see it, then burn it in the fireplace in front of them both? What if he was waiting for the right excuse to start a fire in her precious library, starting with that book?

She'd better tread carefully on the eggshells around him.

* * *

"C-can I help you?" Bella asked, her rough voice shaking as she folded herself more tightly into herself. Her growling mixed freely with her whine, and Damian couldn't help but to marvel at what was happening in front of him. Here he was, offering her a book, and she almost took it, but then she recoiled as if he had struck her, and asked if she could do something for him.

Damian took a moment to consider Bella's life before she was the Mistress of the castle. Maybe she used to be a servant. Perhaps she had been forced to be the previous Master's servant, and if she ever did something without his permission or direct order she was beaten.

Damian shook the thought out of his brain. Beasty was huge. There was not a thing on earth that could have bossed it around. Still, Damian couldn't help but to think that Bella was more terrified of Damian than Damian could possibly be afraid of her.

Damian took a deep breath, determined to push his pride aside. As long as he was stuck in her castle, he might as well learn something. Especially since he had always wanted to learn how to read. His old man had taught him about numbers, and how to add and subtract and multiply and divide, but never how to read. 'Not enough time' he'd said. Now, Damian had nothing but time.

"I think you can. At least, I-I hope you can," Damian mentally cursed himself for stuttering. Damian quickly composed himself before saying confidently, "You can read, yes?"

Bella studied his face, and Damian forced himself not to flinch under her tear-jerkingly lonely eyes. She answered cautiously, as if he had asked a trick question,

"Yes, I can,"

"Could you teach me?" Damian was embarrassed. He could feel the tips of his ears catch on fire, and his pride start to break; he could practically feel the cracks.

"How to read?" Beasty seemed surprised. Damian almost ran out of the room when she showed him her teeth, but then she said, "Of course I'll teach you!"

_She's…what is she doing? _Damian thought when she didn't make a move towards him. Then he realized, _She's… smiling!_

_..._

_The next day, Damian walked into the library, and was surprised to find a table in front of the couch by the fireplace. On the table were multiple sheets of paper. He walked over to find symbols on each of them._

_"Before you learn to read, you need to know the alphabet,"_

_Damian nearly jumped out of his skin as Beasty crept behind him, seemingly out of nowhere. Bella seemed to wince at his reaction and curled on the couch, as far as she possibly could from Damian. Damian sucked in a breath and said,_

_"Alright, the alphabet, so where do I start?"_

_Bella smiled again, and Damian forced himself not to stare at her teeth. She leaned a little closer and moved one sheet closer to him than the rest._

_"This is the letter A. It makes three sounds: a as in apple, a as in accustomed, and a as in a. I'm not sure how you learn, exactly, but I learn by feeling what I'm being taught,"_

I learn that way, too_, Damian thought._

_"How do I feel a letter?" Damian asked, instead. Bella shifted in her seat, then took out a feather and small ink pot from a drawer in the table._

_"I'm assuming you know what these are?" After Damian nodded, Bella continued, "Trace the A and then write it on your own. Then I want you mark as many 'a's as you can find in this book,"_

_Bella put a thin book next to Damian. While it seemed like a lot of work, Damian was surprisingly excited. He really needed something to keep his mind off wallowing in self pity._

_"Alright," Damian said while rolling up his sleeves. "I can do this,"_

_And he did, and it was so much more difficult than he thought it was going to be. That day, Bella taught him five letters. Vowels, she called them. A, E, I, O, U. By the time it was time for dinner, every word in the book Bella let him write on was marked, and he had learned that every word had a vowel._

_..._

The next day, Bella taught Damian only two letters: B and D. They were tricky because they looked almost the exact same in their lower case forms.

_"This one's a… B?" Damian guessed, trying to figure out how on earth he was going to get these two letters straight._

_"No, that's a D,"_

_Damian groaned and flopped backwards on the couch, his aching back gladly accepting the plush velvet of the pillows behind him._

_"I'm never going to get this right, am I?" Damian grumbled, mainly to himself. Instead of answering him, Bella reached for a paper and picked the quill off the table where Damian left it. She quickly scribbled something onto the paper and leaned back, motioning for Damian to see what she drew._

_There were two things there. The first a bed, the second a word._

_"The word spells 'bed,'" Bella explained. "See how it looks like a bed? Eventually, you'll just be able to tell whether it's a B or a D, but for now, you can use a bed as your reference,"_

_Damian had simply looked at her, wondering how she could still have so much patience. He checked a clock and nearly choked on his own spit. He had been sitting there with her for almost four hours, struggling over two letters. How could she have possibly been so patient with this when she had blown up almost immediately when he had thought of touching her rose? Bella was a complex puzzle, and Damian only had about half of the pieces he needed to solve her._

_..._

The third day Bella taught him nothing, and they simply reviewed what Damian had already learned.

_"That's an I," Damian said, smirking at the beast on his left. She simply pointed to another letter, and Damian paused for a second, envisioning Bella's 'bed' diagram in his mind before saying confidently,_

_"B"_

_Bella's slight upward curl of her fuzzy lips was all the answer Damian needed._

_..._

The fourth day, Bella taught him five more letters: C, F, G, H, and J.

_"Why does the G look so much like the C?"_

_Bella stared at him for a second, as if wondering if his question was real, or if he was just joking around with her._

_"I didn't make the alphabet. I only learned it," She answered when she was sure he wasn't trying to be funny._

_"I knew that!" Damian grumbled. I was just wondering why,"_

_"Not everything has a reason," Bella said so softly that Damian almost missed that she said it. He wondered if she was still talking about the alphabet._

_"This is little G," She said suddenly, refocusing Damian's thoughts, "But it can also look like this,"_

_"Why do they look so different?"_

_..._

Then, the fifth day, they reviewed again. Damian was able to read small words by himself, and he was so excited.

_"C…a…ca…t? Cat?" Damian asked, looking to Bella. She grinned at him, and Damian surprised both of them by grinning back._

_..._

It took a while, about a week and a half, for Damian to learn the entire alphabet. And even when he had learned it all, he hadn't fully learned how to read.

_"Finally!" Damian yelled when Bella had informed him that Z was the last letter in the alphabet. Bella had watched on as Damian leapt off the couch and walked over to one of the book shelves. He took it back to the couch and started saying aloud,_

_"O…n…c..e… Onkie?" He looked up at Bella, who was laughing silently at him. A terrible thought crossed his mind. What if this had all been a cruel joke, and she had been teaching him the wrong sounds for the letters?_

_"You can't read yet," Bella said, the humor still in her voice. At Damian's blank expression, she picked up the book Damian had given her, It Happened at Midnight and told him to read the first three words. After a little bit of time, he gave her the correct words, but when he tried the last word, he came up with something like,_

_"Mid-ni-g-huh-t?"_

_"You know the letters, but that's only the first step," Bella explained._

_Damian was taken back to when his old man was still teaching him his math skills. Damian had wanted more than anything to solve quadratic equations. They looked so complex, so important; Damian had wanted to know how to do them._

_Damian had told his father that he was ready after he had mastered the basics of arithmetic. His father had laughed and said that while he wasn't quite on the first step anymore, he still had quite the stairway to climb before he got to the level which allowed him to solve parabolas and quadratic equations yet._

_"What?" Damian asked her._

_"You know what the sounds are supposed to sound like, but there are exceptions. We call them phonics. Like, for instance, this word, here," Bella opened up the book with a special care and flipped to a certain page, went immediately to a specific paragraph, a particular line, and pointed to an individual word. Damian couldn't figure out how Bella knew that word would be there… unless…_

Does she have the entire library memorized?_ He wondered idly._

_"Huh?" Damian asked. Bella had just told him to do something, but he wasn't paying attention. He blushed in shame._

_"U-uh," she stammered for a minute, then growled for a second. Not even thinking about what he was doing, Damian said,_

_"No need to be afraid, Dear, just tell me what you wanted me to do,"_

_Bella's ears perked up at the nickname, and her eyes shone with an affectionate glow Damian had not seen before. They stared at each other for a second before Bella broke the silence by saying,_

_"Write this word down and tell me the letters, please,"_

_That day Damian learned that if S and H were placed next to each other, they made the 'Sh' sound, like in splash._

_..._

The next day, Damian was just starting to learn that C and H made the 'ch' sound when Chip was brought in by a bedside table. Bella immediately stood up and rushed over to them. Damian suddenly felt cold without her warm body next to him, but he turned to see what was going on. He had never seen Bella look so urgent.

"What happened?" She growled at the table. It simply opened its drawer and Bella gasped. "Alright, bring him to the couch. Hurry!" She snapped. Over the couple of weeks Damian had spent with Bella in the library, he had gotten used to her flashes of fear, and thought he knew how to calm her down. He didn't want the little teacup or table to get scared by Bella's reaction to her own fear.

"Calm down, Dear, I'm sure that Chip is fine,"

Bella was trembling as she turned to Damian and snapped,

"He is not,"

Thrown by her answer, Damian looked down to see what the big deal was. There, on the table, was Chip. He was whole for the most part, but a couple of pieces were chipped off of him and they were laid very carefully next to him, along with some glue.

Damian watched as Bella carefully picked the little teacup, as if he were a book, and brushed some of the paste on a little section of the chipped part on Chip. Then, between two of her sharp claws, she placed one of the broken off parts on his rim. She held it there for a second, calming Chip down by rumbling soothing things like, "I know it hurts right now, Dear, but it'll get better, I promise," and "Hold still now. There's a good boy," All the while, the young teacup whimpered in pain.

Damian took the table aside and asked what had happened to Chip. It opened and closed its drawer in a way which seemed almost like a language all its own. Damian smiled apologetically down at the table and said,

"Thank you for trying, but that didn't really clear anything up. Sorry,"

The table seemed to huff and stalked out of the library. Damian cringed as the table somehow slammed the large doors shut, but then went to stand by Bella and Chip.

Bella worked fast, she had already finished pasting Chip back together.

"What, uh, what happened?" Damian asked, concerned for the pained sounds the little teacup was making.

"He fell from his cupboard and chipped himself. Good thing Jacques was there, or this could have been a whole lot worse,"

"I-it's just a chip, isn't it?"

Bella paused for a second before turning to Damian.

"If one of your fingers fell off, we could just leave it off, right? It's just a finger?"

Damian was speechless. What a chip really that bad?

"I'm sorry," Damian apologized sincerely. This was her world, he had no right to criticize or question the things she said about her own staff, especially since he had no idea how everything worked here, "I had no idea,"

Bella sighed and mumbled that she knew and that she forgave. She curved her mouth into a sly smile and said,

"Just don't do it again,"

Damian lay in his bed that night, wondering what he had just witnessed. Had Bella been… teasing him? Joking with him? Did beasts even have a sense of humor?

Damian cringed. He hadn't thought of Bella as a beast in… he didn't even know how long. She just seemed so… _human_. She had feelings, and even if she didn't always know how to properly express them, her eyes betrayed her. She thought like a human, and she spoke like a human. She cared like a human. She got scared like a human.

For Damian, the line which had clearly divided Bella from the rest of humanity was beginning to blur, and it both made him extremely uneasy and completely comfortable at the same time.


	8. Changing Opinions

**Chapter 8**

**Damian/Bella**

Damian wondered how things got to the point they were at now as he waited for her out in the snow.

He was sure that for a while he hated a 'Beasty.' He had even gone to the one place 'Beasty' had forbidden him to go- the east wing- just to justify escaping 'Beasty's castle. But then, after he had run away, a major shift had taken place in his attitude towards 'Beasty' (not that either of them knew it then). 'Beasty' had saved his life from a wild pack of wolves, getting seriously injured in the process, and all 'it' had asked for in return was some respect. All 'Beasty' wanted was for Damian to call 'it' Bella. So he had.

He was sure that there were a few days of grudging respect. While he had still detested being anywhere near 'Bella,' he hated not using his mind even more. So, when he had decided that he was going to learn how to read. He had pushed his distaste and pride aside to ask 'Bella' to teach him how to read. 'She' had surprisingly been a patient teacher, not getting frustrated even once. He spent a lot of time with 'her' during those few weeks, learning the letters and phonics, but he had still escaped any chance he could, and the castle was large enough to keep him interested in exploring it for hours on end.

But then, without him even knowing it had happened, Damian had started to think of the Mistress of the castle less and less as 'Beasty' and more and more as 'Bella.' He started spending time with Bella even when he wasn't learning or practicing how to read or write. He found that she was a puzzle, one which he wanted to solve.

She growled and yelled when she was scared. She mouthed the words she read in her books, and got angry and scared and happy for the characters. She made sure that everyone around her was comfortable before she even thought of herself, and if she made anyone feel uneasy she would leave, no matter how much it hurt her feelings.

She would get more comfortable around Damian and even tease him lightly. The first couple of times she did, Damian wondered if beasts even knew what teasing was, but then he realized that it didn't matter. A beast wasn't teasing him, _Bella _was.

Sometimes, Bella would be with her servants and he would be happening to walk by, then her servant would say something meant only for Bella's ears. She would look so incredibly guilty and sad and so much like a kicked puppy that Damian couldn't just leave her like that. He would ask her to accompany him somewhere, anywhere- the dining room, the ballroom, the library- just to get her mind off of whatever it was the servants had said to her.

It started happening so often that Damian made it a point to tell the staff to not say anything like that to Bella anymore. To make sure that they listened to him, Damian tried to stay with Bella as often as he could, giving the staff a certain look when he felt that they were making Bella feel bad.

It was probably around then that Bella started becoming less an acquaintance and more a friend.

More and more often Damian found himself in the company of his large friend, and he didn't even care about her looks anymore. In fact, the only time he paid attention to her appearance was when he was admiring them. Her fur blended seamlessly into her scales, her delicately twisted horns placed with purpose on her head. Her face was narrow, her form streamlined. In beast terms, Bella must have been quite beautiful.

The one time Damian had brought it up, Bella had looked so shocked that Damian wondered if no one had ever told her she looked beautiful before. She had said that it was difficult to find beauty within a beast.

"_Bella," he had said. _

"_Hmm?" Bella had rumbled from her spot a little ways over on the couch. She had been reading a book, but she pulled herself away from it in order to speak to him. Damian couldn't help but to feel a bit of pride that he had been able to pull Bella away from a book she had clearly been engrossed in. He pushed the thought aside to ask something that had been on his mind for the past quarter of an hour. _

"_You're quite beautiful, aren't you?" _

"_What?" She had asked, eyes wide, book completely forgotten. She leaned forward a little, as if she couldn't hear him correctly, then cringed away. Why? What did he say? Cautiously, Damian continued with his train of thought,_

"_I just mean that," Damian paused. He didn't want Bella to think that he had been staring at her, in case it made her self-conscious. She had just recently stopped wearing her hooded cloak unless she was cold. He didn't want her to go back to hiding herself and being afraid of him. "Aren't you more accurately placed on the more elegant side of the looks spectrum?"_

"_What?" This time, Bella was simply confused. Damian tended to do that when he was flustered; he ended up making sentences entirely too complex for most people to understand. Sometimes he didn't even understand himself when he was like that. He tried again,_

"_Compared to most other… wolves and such, aren't you?"_

_Bella had growled, and Damian had wondered what on earth she could have been afraid of. She looked down at her paws, and at her shadow, and her growling grew louder. She had said, _

"_It is hard to see the beauty in a beast. You are a truly special person if you can find some in this one," _

_Damian had tried to ignore the warmth that grew in his chest from Bella's compliment, instead choosing to wonder about her answer. He had wondered why such a kind person as Bella had found it impossible to find beauty in herself. Damian had sighed, chalking it up as just another piece for the puzzle Bella was._

Even after Damian was sure that Bella's staff would be more careful about what they said around Bella, he continued to stay around Bella almost every second of the day. At first he told himself it was because there was nothing else to do. He had already explored every square inch of the castle, and outside it was cold, the ground was coated in a thick layer of ice.

As time went by, however, he found that his excuse was invalid. He eventually confessed to himself that the reason he spent time with Bella was because he truly wanted to.

While all the other girls he had ever spoken to had walked on eggshells around him, being careful to never tell him exactly why they were upset, or what he was doing to bother them, Bella was different. At first she would press her ears against her skull and whine or growl, but after a second or two of just staring at Damian, she would tell him what he was doing that was bothering her. She would even tell him what he could do instead. Not only was the frankness of her thoughts refreshing, but her personality itself was charming. He liked how kind she was. He liked how patient she was. He liked just sitting in the library and listening to her tell him stories, or read to him. He liked how if she wasn't interested in what he was saying, she would find a way to make it interesting, either by learning more on the subject, or asking Damian to teach her more of what he was talking about.

The more time Damian spent with her, the more he wanted to spend with her, and he wasn't entirely sure as to why.

* * *

Bella smiled down at Lumiere, amused. She was steps from going outside, wrapped in the only piece of clothing which she felt comfortable wearing- her purple robe. But, she didn't wear it because she was self-conscious anymore.

While she was always comfortable around her staff, she always had a sense of guilt hanging over her when she spoke with them. Even if they were joking about being human again, or whispering amongst themselves wistfully, about of the things they could do if they had hands or feet, or legs… somewhere deep inside of Bella, she knew it was her fault, and she couldn't help but be upset. It was her fault that her entire staff- her loyal, king, patient staff- was turned into various household decorations, appliances, and furniture.

But, whenever she was around Damian, she felt safe. Bella couldn't explain why, but there was something about his slight defensiveness and never-ending wit that was endearing. There was something about the way he looked at her and spoke with her that made her insides tingle with a warmth she wasn't used to. But, every time she tried to explain to Lumiere her feelings about their guest, it ended up exactly like this.

"I am just saying, Mistress," Lumiere continued, sounding cross, "That the young Gerard is not his father. He is not gentle, not understanding, and completely- how do you say?- judgmental! You should stay away from him, Mistress, before he hurts you!"

"Oh, hush you," Mrs. Potts admonished from a few feet behind her candelabrum friend. The kind elderly woman-turned-teapot turned to Bella and said gently, "Mistress, if you love him, it will hurt you more to stay away. At least spend the time you have with him by his side. Now, ignore old Lummie, and go spend time with that boy of yours,"

Bella chuckled as she turned to go outside.

"Wha-wha… Lummie?" Lumiere sounded absolutely outraged at the nickname.

"Not so fun when you're on the receiving end, is it?" came the smug voice of Cogsworth.

"Ah, that is completely different, Coggie,"

"Why you-!"

Bella stopped listening as soon as she saw Damian. He was wearing one of her father's old coats, and it was just a little too big for him. He was fumbling with the tying in the back, so Bella tentatively reached forward. Before she tried anything too daring, she asked,

"I could help you with that, if you'd like?"

"No, I've got it," Damian grunted, moving his arms into some strange position behind his back, trying to push the pins into their holes. Damian mumbled a bit. "Curse this jacket,"

Bella stayed still, watching curiously as Damian struggled a little more with the coat until he finally sighed. She looked at him innocently, and Damian sighed a little more.

"I'm going to have fun with this," She told him, "So, you can ask nicely, and I can decide whether I help you or not,"

Damian rolled his eyes and scoffed, but Bella could see the smile on his face. It was a nice smile. He looked so care-free, so happy. He didn't belong in the castle he was bound to, but Bella was too selfish to let him leave.

Before she could let the guilt consume her, Bella reached for Damian's coat and quickly pinned the correct straps into their respective holes. She stepped back and grinned at Damian. He had been aiming far too high when he was trying on his own.

"I could have done it myself, you know," Damian told her, blushing a little. Bella just nodded.

"Absolutely, I know you could have,"

"It's just that this coat is about ten years out of fashion, and I haven't seen any like this since I was a little boy,"

Out of fashion? How long exactly had Bella been trapped there? She took a long look at her castle. The rock was dark and crumbling, and the gargoyles decorating the terraces were snarling down at her, as if they wanted to shred her to pieces. Her windows were dusty and some of the panels were cracked. There were little nests where the especially brave birds came to nest every year, and those dried up tufts of grass and dirt were the homiest parts of her castle. Bella sighed.

Before she was turned into what she was, this coat had been the height of fashion. Everyone wanted one. Now, Damian was telling her that it was out of fashion, that he hadn't even _seen_ one in years. What had she doomed her staff to? Even if she got Damian to fall in love with her and everyone became human again, what could they possibly go back to? The world kept moving without them. This was just one coat, but what else had changed?

"Hey, are you alright?" Damian asked, voice full of concern. His dark brown eyes were staring intensely at Bella. A small lock of his chocolate hair fell into his eyes, but he paid it no attention."I'm really glad that you helped me, if that's what this is about,"

Bella would have usually stuttered some form of 'I'm fine,' and looked away from the illegally handsome man, but she wasn't in the mood for lying. She didn't want to say a thing. All she wanted to do was sit in the cold snow and watch whatever fun thing Damian was going to do, saying that she was too tired to join him when he would ask her to come closer.

Instead, Damian said,

"Want to see what some of the kids are doing nowadays?"

Eagerly, Bella stood straighter, paying close attention as Damian taught.

"Well, first, you need to bend down and grab some snow in your hands," Damian demonstrated, picking up some of the newly fallen snow. He motioned for her to do the same, and she did. Then, he started patting it firmly, explaining, "Then you start patting it into a ball, try not to keep it too soft. You need to make sure it's sturdy," It took Bella a few tries because she kept breaking her ball, but eventually she had a good sized one in her paws, about the size of Damian's head because of how large her paws were.

"Now what?" Bella asked, seconds before Damian threw his ball of snow at her. He laughed at her stricken face.

"They call it a 'snow ball fight,'" Damian explained quickly, probably because he saw the hurt Bella was feeling inside being reflected on her face. "I throw one at you, and you throw one at me,"

Bella's mind started turning. So… this was a game? Who won? The person who hit the other with the most… 'snow balls?' Well, then, Bella couldn't lose. She forced herself to look even more hurt, and for her muscles to relax slightly.

"Oh, no... Bella?" Damian started moving towards her. _Just a little closer_ Bella thought to herself. "I'm so sorry, I should have told you what I was going to do," Bella almost lost her resolve at the look on Damian's face. He was truly worried. His dark eyes burned with concern and regret. But… she had to win. He touched her arm, "Listen, if you don't want to do this, we can go inside and-"

Quick as lightning, Bella smashed her perfectly lumpy snowball on Damian's head. He froze before looking up through his now partially white snow, just in time to see her impish grin.

"Do I win?" Bella grinned.

"You tricked me," Damian sounded like he was in a daze, like he couldn't believe she actually did that.

"I beat you," Bella corrected.

"You do realize this is war now, right?" Damian raised one of his perfect eyebrows as he looked up at her. Bella almost lost herself in his melodic voice until she recognized the challenge in his teasing voice.

"You do realize that it's only a war if there's a question about who's going to win, right?"

Damian, accepting the challenge, apparently, knelt to the ground and made a quick snowball, throwing it at her. Bella roared with laughter and ran in the opposite direction, already coming up with a plan. She stopped by a particularly large patch of snow and starting making her ammunition, all the while getting hit by the snow balls Damian was making one at a time. After she had a nice pile of snowballs just waiting to be thrown, Bella turned to the offensive, pelting Damian with wave after wave of snowballs.

Bella kept throwing and getting hit, and running and laughing, and having fun until Mrs. Potts and Cogsworth called the two of them inside, saying it was getting too late.

Once inside, Bella told Damian to have a warm bath and change his clothes.

"Real quick," Damian stopped her before she went to do the same. He rubbed the back of his neck before turning around. "Could you undo the ties?"

"Of course,"

Bella leaned down to unpin the clasps. As it turned out, putting the pins in was a whole lot different than taking the pins out, especially with her Beasty claws. After a while of fruitless effort to take the coat off of Damian, Bella felt him shiver, so she simply tore the jacket in half.

He turned to gape at her, the coat hanging limply on him. She smiled sheepishly at him before shrugging. Before he even had a chance to ask, she answered,

"It's a thing of the past. There's no point in hanging onto it,"

"But, it looked so expensive. It couldn't have had no meaning to it at all. Someone important had to have worn that coat,"

Bella looked down at the coat on Damian's form. It was made of a deep blue velvet, embroidered with only the finest gold strings, with a silk purple lining, and buttons made of only the purest ivory. It used to only be worn by her father. The one man who was supposed to love her no matter what. The same man who had tried to kill her, even after she and the staff had explained everything.

"This coat and the man it used to belong to have no meaning to me. No importance. If you would like another coat like this one, I'm sure I could find another, but don't think of how expensive or important it is. Times have changed. Those types of things simply don't matter anymore,"

Damian stood there for a moment, shivering slightly.

"Could I read today?" He asked suddenly. Bella smiled at him and nodded, grateful that he had more sense than to pry.

After they both had a warm bath and Damian changed into some new clothes, both of them sat down to eat. The chef had prepared some warm soup for them, along with some fresh bread and steamed vegetables and a slice of meat for them each.

They both spoke easily, and before either of them realized it, they were finished and being shooed to the library by the servants. They walked down the hallways in a comfortable silence, Bella only occasionally stealing a peak at her handsome companion, loving the way his eyes and hair lightened and darkened with the candles on the wall, and the way the shadows on his face defined his jaw and neck.

They both sat in front of the fire, Bella sitting so close to him that she could feel the warmth emanating from him. She had already picked a simple book from her collection for him to read, so he began, going slowly as she often advised him. He would get faster with practice.

As he read, Bella reflected on her friend. Her heart yearned for him to be more. Already she knew that she loved him. She had never felt the almost unbearable warmth and fuzziness in her stomach whenever he was around, and she had never been in love before.

She loved how he was kind to her. She loved how he treated her like she wasn't a monster. She loved how even though he thought that she had been trying to kill his father, he still gave her a chance. She loved that he liked her staff. She loved that he tried his best at everything he did. She loved how being alone in a castle in the middle of nowhere with none of his friends or family didn't break him. She loved how he made her feel. And she wanted to make him feel that way, too.

**So, to the two of you that reviewed, thanks a lot! This is my favorite story that I've written, and my least reviewed, which I think is ironic, but what can you do? I really like where the story is going, but I'm pretty sure only three people in fanfiction think that, so I'm not too sure if I'll be finishing it. I'll post the next chapter after this one, but if there aren't enough reviews, I think I'll just give up... Still, to the two who reviewed, you really made my day. Both of the comments started with 'wow' which I took as a good sign. Till next time, :)**


	9. Surprises

**Chapter 9**

**Damian/Bella**

Damian was sure the day was going to be just like every other day the first five minutes he was awake. He had gotten up, stumbled to his bathroom, and then fumbled with his now unreasonably disgusting shirt before heading off to have a nice breakfast with Bella.

As soon as he had opened his door, he realized that for some reason, it was not going to be an average day. Instead of a couple of tables and chairs wobbling lazily about with Cogsworth yelling at them and Lumiere laughing at the clock, there seemed to be an endless stream of servants rushing around the hallway. The chairs held some other servants, like some sort of communal transportation for furniture. The corner tables had towels spilling from their drawers, and on the ground, countless lamps, silverware, feather-dusters, and a book shelf swam in the waves of mayhem right outside of Damian's room.

As much as he wanted to just stay there, watching the amusingly confusing spectacle in front of him, Damian knew that he couldn't. For one, Bella would be waiting for him in the dining room. If he didn't show up, that would hurt her feelings, and no matter how many times she would say that she was fine, Damian would be able to see how upset she was by looking in her eyes. And, for another thing, Damian was hungry.

It took a while because Damian had to make sure not to step on anyone, but he finally made it out of the hallway. He kept going, navigating through the congested halls. It seemed that the entire staff had had a meeting last night and decided to clean the entire castle, because everywhere Damian turned, there was a staff member or two, and they would be cleaning everything they could reach. A few of them were humming, and a couple dancing. They seemed awfully cheery for a collection of wood-work who had taken on the task of cleaning a castle which took Damian weeks to explore.

"I'm so sorry I'm late, Be-" Damian cut himself off. He took in the scene in front of him and a silent smile crept onto his face. Bella was there, back facing away from him, but he could tell what she was doing. Or, trying to do, as it seemed.

Damian was always interested when Bella was trying to figure something out. He liked the way her soft hair bristled slightly, and how her shoulders slumped down a little while she tried to understand whatever it was. Other than Lilith, Damian had never seen a woman try to use her mind, and he was always intrigued when Bella did.

"But Mrs. Potts, I'm telling you, I really don't know! Why is everyone doing this?" Bella asked, her rumbling voice sending feelings of comfort and warmth through Damian. Mrs. Potts chucked sadly,

"Darling, has it really been that long?"

"What? Been that long since what?"

Damian quietly stepped closer, wondering what Mrs. Potts was talking about.

"Bella, darling Mistress, in four days, it's to be your birthday,"

Damian hadn't ever thought of Bella even having a birthday, but he figured they were universally uplifting days. It didn't' matter that Bella wasn't human, it was her birthday! How could someone not celebrate and be happy on the day they were born?

"Congrats, Bella! Happy early birthday!" Damian exclaimed excitedly from behind her slumped form, walking forward to offer her a friendly hug. But, to Damian's shock, Bella looked at him with fear in her eyes. Fear he hadn't seen in months.

Damian's hands dropped to his sides like they were weighted down by stone. He wondered what he could have possibly done to scare her. Maybe he should've made his presence known before coming out of nowhere to congratulate her. What shocked him even more was when she started growling and turned to Mrs. Potts.

"What did you say?" Bella all but screamed. Damian set his confusion aside. He could always get answers later, but the longer no one calmed Bella down, the longer she was afraid. And Damian couldn't stand seeing her afraid.

"Bella, Dear, look at me," Damian had long ago realized that Bella loved it when he called her Dear. It turned out to be a good thing, considering the amount of times the term slipped out of Damian's mouth.

Damian thought himself to be very capable at calming Bella down. The only time he hadn't been able to do so was when he had tried to touch her rose. But then, she had been _angry, _not afraid. This time, she was afraid, but he still couldn't get through to the rational part of her. She still seemed to be terrified. _Of what?_ Damian couldn't help but wonder. He seriously hoped it wasn't himself. What had he done?

"How long have you known about this?" Bella snarled at Mrs. Potts.

"As long as you've been born, Darling. We all assumed you remembered as well!" Mrs. Potts seemed flustered, but Damian always had a hard time deciphering the emotions of the china. The tables and chairs he could get along with passably well, and could even correctly tell their emotions almost half of the time. The silverware and brooms were a different story altogether. It was impossible to tell what they felt unless they were upset with him, and then he could only tell because they would try to hurt him. The easiest furnishings to understand the feelings of were Lumiere and Cogsworth, and Lumiere mostly because Bella always seemed to find the time to carve the emotion he needed on his face.

"Like I could have," Bella growled, but Damian could tell that she was sad. Underneath the layers of her rough and gravelly voice, Damian heard a slight whining. All he had to do was pay attention. And when it came to Bella, that wasn't hard.

"It's been ten years since this happened last. I don't think I could remember my own mother's face,"

"Hush hush, Darling," Mrs. Potts chided. "It's time to put a brave face on. No time for self-pity. You've only got three more days!"

Almost instantly Bella started to calm down. For that, Damian was glad. But for some reason, he felt oddly… disappointed that it hadn't been him who had pushed the fear out of her eyes. It seemed that no matter how much time Damian spent with Bella and her staff, they were always hiding something- some big secret of which he was the only one out of the loop.

"_We've_ only got _four_ more days," Bella corrected gently. Then she stood up and faced Damian, who grinned at her. While her staff might still be able to calm her down, he exclusively had the right to joke and tease and read with her. The thought put him at ease.

"Bella," Damian invited, "Would you like to go to the library with me?"

Bella only grinned down at him, but that was all the answer he needed.

As the two walked into their hideaway from the rest of the castle, still in complete and utter chaos because of the operation for cleanliness, Damian's head started swirling with questions. Why hadn't Bella remembered it was her birthday? Why was she so afraid when Mrs. Potts told her about it? What did she have only four more days for? Why hadn't they celebrated her birthday in… ten years, was it?

Bella sighed softly next to him as the two sat down on the plush velvet couch, in front of the fireplace. Damian turned to look at her, wondering if there was anything else she was scared of, or worried about.

"Go ahead," Bella grumbled, crossing her arms, but Damian could see a small smile at the corners of her mouth. She curled up on her section of the couch. She took up so much room that her rose-scented fur rubbed against Damian's arm.

"'Go ahead' what?" Damian asked, confused. Bella snorted softly.

"Don't think that by now I don't know your 'I have a million questions, but I don't want to bother anyone, so I'll just sit here quietly' face. Just start with the most important question you can think of, and we'll go from there,"

Damian sat in silence for a moment. No one ever told him he had a face for that. Did no one but Bella truly know him that well? What else had she noticed about him that he hadn't known of?

Damian shook the thought off. He wanted answers, but not about that. The most important question first…

"What were you so afraid of?" Damian asked. Before he received the confused look he was sure Bella was going to give him, Damian elaborated, "When Mrs. Potts said your birthday was in four days, you were afraid. Of what? What will happen? Something terrible? Are you going to be alright? Is someone going to hurt you? Are-"

Bella's laughing cut him off. He quieted down and waited for her to answer, nearly bouncing off of the couch in anticipation for the answer. He loved getting answers, almost as much as he loved Bella.

_Wait, wha-_

"No, no, nothing like that. There's…" Bella paused for a second, but plunged on before Damian could contemplate his feelings for his sweet-smelling friend. "A little deal that I made with someone once. If I want to have my end of the bargain lived up to, I have to submit my half in four days,"

"Well, what do you need?" Damian asked, hoping to keep his mind occupied. He hadn't missed his thoughts earlier. Did he love Bella? A couple of months ago, it would have seemed impossible. But, now… he needed to keep his mind busy. He would need to truly think about this, alone. Maybe tomorrow.

"Uhhh…" For the first time since Damian had known her, Bella was at a loss for words. Her eyes bore into his own, gray storms of emotion swirled in each orb. Damian wondered what she was thinking.

"Come on," Damian coaxed. "I'll help you, if you don't have whatever you need ready yet. Just tell me,"

Bella chuckled lowly, a strange glint in her eyes which Damian had never seen before. She told him to forget about it, and then picked out a book for the two of them to read together. Damian managed to persuade her into reading it to him, and in a few short pages, Damian was completely submerged in a world with pirates and dragons and forbidden romances. As he looked at Bella's face, growling lowly with worry for James, the main pirate in the story, Damian realized that he truly did not want this quiet ease he had found with Bella to ever end.

To Damian's complete and utter astonishment, the servants managed to clean the entire castle, and still had time left over to set up a miniature ball for him and Bella to celebrate her twenty-first birthday.

While he hadn't had much time to look for a truly suitable gift, Damian had tried his best. Seconds after the present was wrapped and ready for Bella to open, Lumiere and Cogsworth had hopped into his room. He had given up trying to understand how they opened doors when they didn't have anything which could possibly help them.

"Young Gerard!" Lumiere greeted.

"Please, call me Damian," he sighed. This conversation had happened far too many times, and now Damian only participated in it because it was almost like a tradition between the two.

"Oui, oui, Young Gerard, but we must make a couple of, how do we say?" Lumiere turned to his companion, who immediately filled in the rest of the sentence for his sometimes-friend.

"We must make a few things clear, and we must get you ready,"

"Ready?" Damian asked.

"Oui, ready!"

"For… the ball?"

"See, he really is his father's son!" Lumiere beamed. Well, Damian assumed he was beaming. There was a larger than normal smile on his candle stick, but that could have been because Bella swiped it on in a hurry.

"First! We must tell you the rules:" Cogsworth puffed his chest out as he started. "You must always eat with a fork and knife. The only time to ever use a spoon is when you are drinking soup, but under no circumstances can you use your bare hands,"

"I-I really don't think I do that anyway-"

"Secondly!" Lumiere interjected, "You must dance with the Mistress,"

"But I don't even know how to-"

"And when you do, you must sweep her off her feet," Lumiere continued dreamily. His wick lit on fire, and the small flame waved gently with the tune he hummed. Cogsworth's minute and hour hands spun. Damian couldn't help but think that the clock was rolling his eyes. Damian would, too, if he wasn't so confused.

"You must refrain from eating too much," Cogsworth continued on.

"How am I supposed to know when it's too-"

"And you must never excuse yourself from the Mistress's presence,"

"What if I have to go to the-"

"You have to…" They just kept going on and on. Damian was rapidly going from confused to irritated. He liked the furniture staff. Truly, he did. He knew that they were always looking out for their Mistress, and he had to respect that. He knew that Cogsworth and Lumiere had come to his room for a reason, but they were taking their sweet time getting to the main point, and Damian was rapidly losing his patience.

"But above all else-" Cogsworth cut Lumiere off, and Damian could feel his temper rising to a dangerous level, but he calmed himself down. They were finally getting to the main point. They would tell him what they needed to tell him, and then they would leave him to dress for ball.

"You must never, ever, ever look disgusted,"

"Oui," suddenly Lumiere was all business. "Though the Mistress is comfortable around you, even the smallest wince from you will have her back to the way she used to be around you. And you don't want that, do you?"

"Wait, wait, wait," Damian stopped them. "You think I would get disgusted by Bella?" Damian looked between the clock and the candelabrum. "You're crazy," Damian said, not quite believing what he was hearing. He shook his head firmly before saying in a strong voice, "How could I be disgusted by anyone so patient and kind? Someone so smart and funny? Someone so selfless? Someone so beautiful?"

"Beautiful?" Lumiere asked. Damian was talking before he knew what he was even saying, something he had never done before. He usually always thought before he spoke.

"Yes, beautiful. Her fur is soft and silky, always. Her teeth are clean, and her face is always washed. Her scales are never dry, and her horns are always filed down. She does her best to make sure that her form- whatever it is- is the best it can be. She's beautiful, and not just on the inside, either. She's all those things I said before, and more. She's talented, and brave, and she really, truly cares about everyone. It's hard to see, and you just have to be willing to look close enough to see it, but Bella is the most beautiful thing I've ever seen,"

Lumiere and Cogsworth turned to each other before wobbling over to Damian's closet.

"What are you doing now?" Damian asked, exasperated. He didn't know why, but the idea that someone thought that he was capable of being disgusted by Bella had rubbed him the wrong way. The idea of _anyone_ being disgusted by Bella rubbed him the wrong way. She was hard-working and loving, and she didn't deserve that kind of treatment.

"Well, we must get you ready," Lumiere answered, peering up at the hung clothes from the ground.

"I have a lovely blue suit," suggested the dresser Lumiere was inspecting.

"No, no," Lumiere muttered, "I checked the mirror. Blue is out of style. Black, though, black is still acceptable,"

"I do have a fine black one, too," the dresser supplied. Lumiere took a look at it and turned to Damian.

"Young Gerard! I have found your suit!"

"I heard," Damian said dryly, walking over to check out Lumiere's pick. He shrugged on the jacket, then grinned at Lumiere. It could work.

Damian stood at the bottom of the stairs which led to the ballroom. When he had stumbled upon it in his early days in the castle, back when he used to explore to find an excuse to stay away from Bella, the room had been coated in dust, and it was basically empty.

Now, the room shined, from the bottom to the top. The wood was polished, and the ripped curtains had been mended. Damian looked at the walls. The staff had scrounged some paintings from around the castle and hung them up. Damian didn't even know Bella had any paintings left.

A cough from Lumiere took Damian's attention from the walls to the staircase. He beamed at what he saw. Or rather, _who_ he saw. It was Bella, but a different Bella than the one Damian had been seeing every day for the past however many weeks.

Her fur was combed, her eyes sparkled, she moved with soft grace. Those parts of her person hadn't changed in the slightest. What did change was that she was wearing clothes. Not just any clothes, but a beautiful ball gown. It was fitted loosely on her figure, and was colored a bright green, bringing out the gray in her eyes and fur. Damian could see her tail trailing behind her as she descended the stairs.

She got to the bottom of the stairs, and she looked to Lumiere. The candelabrum hoped on top of a table. Claude, Damian remembered.

"We present this ball to the Highness Belladonna Casteoux, in honor of her twenty-first birthday, which is to take place in four days. Please, Mistress, enjoy the party,"

Belladonna? Damian looked at Bella. She had never told him that Bella wasn't her real name. Why not? What else had she not told him? Damian found himself excited. At least Bella was still a puzzle. And he still didn't have all the pieces. At least some things never change.

Damian found himself walking across the empty ballroom to be by Bella's side. He smiled gently at her.

"You look beautiful,"

Bella smiled shyly and thanked him. Damian was suddenly unsure of himself. He had never been to a ball before. Until about two minutes ago, he had forgotten that Bella was royalty. She probably had expectations. What if he failed and embarrassed himself? Damian clenched his fist, steeled his nerves, and took a chance, remembering what Lumiere had said earlier.

"Would you be interested in performing a ritualistic partner-reliant activity to celebrate your aging?"

Bella laughed, and said,

"I would love to dance with you,"

Damian couldn't help the flutters in his stomach at the sound of her laugh. He told himself it was because of nervousness. He and Bella were the only ones dancing. If he stumbled even a little, everyone would see.

Damian took a deep breath and took Bella's left hand in his right, and placed his left hand on her waist. Her paw found its way to his shoulder. Damian could easily smell the rose woven into her fur. He could feel the warmth from her body. He could hear her as she hummed along with the music Lumiere had provided.

Damian glided with Bella across the floor, loving the way they two could say nothing at all, and yet everything they needed to.

_I'm nervous,_ Damian swallowed, and looked at the ground.

_Don't be,_ Bella smiled at him, giving his shoulder a soft squeeze. _I'm here_. Her eyes bore into his own.

_Thanks,_ he grinned.

_You still want to get out of here, don't you?_ Bella looked at the door and tilted her head.

_You know me too well,_ Damian cleared his throat. He started leading the dance, and slowly guided the two of them towards the door. When they got close enough, Bella stopped dancing and curtsied. Damian spied her tail wrapping around her feet.

"Thank you for the dance," Bella said softly. Realizing that Bella was still curtsying, Damian hastily bowed.

"No! Thank you for getting me out of there!"

Bella laughed a little, and Damian suddenly realized that he had forgotten about her present. He told Bella to follow him as he headed to his room.

"Where are we going?" asked Bella curiously.

"My room," Damian did his best to not let his excitement seep into his voice. He didn't do a very good job. "I got you a present, but I forgot it in my room," Damian explained as they reached his door. He walked in, letting Bella follow behind him. He dug around the rumpled sheets on his bed before he found the package.

He held out the plain brown parcel to Bella. She gently took it from him and asked,

"Can I open it?"

"It's your birthday," Damian shrugged, even though he was dying to yell _Yes! Yes, open it!_

Bella must've heard his unspoken words, because she grinned and unwrapped the present. She tore the wrapping away and got to the wad of papers Damian had tied together.

"I wrote it," Damian explained quickly. "It's another book for your library. I was already working on it, but your birthday was today, so I had to hurry the ending," Damian's cheeks burned with embarrassment. He had been so sure of his present before right then. What if she decided that she had enough books? What if she didn't like it?

"You…wrote a book for me?" Bella sounded like she was in a trance. She lightly touched the first page before looking up at Damian. He felt the breath leave his body as her eyes pierced holes straight to his soul.

"Do you..." Damian swallowed. "Do you like it?"

"Like it?" Bella laughed with disbelief. "I _love _it. No one's ever done anything like this for me. Thank you,"

Damian let out a sigh of relief.

"You're welcome,"

Bella adopted a thoughtful look before asking,

"Is there anything _you_ want?"

"What?" Damian asked, startled. He really shouldn't have been. Bella always thought of others before she allowed herself happiness.

"Do you… you'd like to see your father, wouldn't you?" Bella suddenly smiled, and said, "Follow me,"

Without a moment's hesitation, Damian followed Bella to the east wing. She led him to her room, still as dark and gloomy as the last time Damian had been there. He made sure to not look at the ripped up portrait of the little girl as he followed Bella in. She placed the book Damian had given her gently on a table before digging around the mountains of things on the floor.

"I know it's here somewhere," she mumbled before she let out a triumphant, "Aha!" She held a mirror in front of Damian, and beamed at him.

"What is it?" Damian asked. It looked like an ordinary hand mirror to him.

"It's magic," Bella reassured. "Just hold it and tell it what you want to see,"

Damian looked at Bella before taking the mirror in his hands. He murmured,

"Could you… show me my father please?"

Nothing happened. Bella laughed. She took the mirror and chuckled out,

"Let me show you," She held the mirror so the reflective side faced Damian. "Show me Damian's father,"

A cloudy swirling covered the face of the mirror, and for a brief moment, Damian could see nothing. But then the cloudiness cleared away and Damian could clearly see his father.

Damian gasped. Bella moved so that she could see the mirror as well.

His father was crouching in a wooden crate, coughing almost non-stop. His fingers, lips, and ears were blue. He was wrapped in a thin burlap blanket, one which had obviously been a source of food for mice and rats.

Damian's father was in Monsieur D'Arc's asylum. Damian's father was dying.

Damian turned to face Bella. As much as he hated it, he knew he would have to leave her on the night of her birthday celebration. But… he had to save his father. He was all the family Damian had left.

To his surprise, Bella grabbed Damian's shoulder and turned him towards the door,

"You have to save him," she said. "Someone's hurting him. You know who they are, don't you?"

Bella barely gave Damian enough time to nod before she hurried him down to the kitchen.

"Silas, give Damian a hot meal. He'll be on the road most of tonight. Damian, when he's given you the meal, come outside. I'll have your horse ready,"

Damian did just as Bella said. She had Philippe all tacked up, and the mirror was in her hands. She helped Damian mount, and before he rode into the woods, she howled, scaring all the wolves away.

"Here," She said, holding the mirror out to Damian.

"I already know where I'm going," Damian assured her.

"It's not for that," Bella said, not quite meeting Damian's eyes. "Just so that you don't forget me,"

"I could never be able to forget you," and Damian meant it, too. "I'll come back, Bella. I promise,"

With that, Damian kicked Philippe into a canter and rode off into the forest. He needed to save his father.

* * *

Bella trudged back to her castle, getting ready to rid herself of the dress on her body. She was worried about Gerard. Of course she was. Gerard was her only friend in the world, and she definitely wanted him safe. But… she had lost Damian.

Her birthday was in three days now. There was no way that Damian would come back that soon. In a fit of emotion, Bella had saved Gerard's life by releasing Damian, and at the same time had doomed her and her staff to a life as non-humans.

**One word: Hard! I knew this chapter was going to be difficult for me. From now on, updates might take a while, because it'll be difficult for me to write. I always knew exactly what I wanted to do for the beginning of this story, but I never really thought this far. I'll just have to see where the story goes, and hope I don't mess it up too much. I got five review! I'm stoked! I'll be finishing this story, btw, even if I don't have like, 100 reviews. I like the story, and so do like, five other people. That's all that really matters, right? :)**


	10. Not Crazy

**Chapter 10**

**Damian**

Damian led Philippe back to his village at a fast pace, disturbed by the silence in the forest. Every other time he had been in it, there was always some sort of noise. Rustling leaves, wind between the trees, animals being scared back home. But this time, Bella had howled the sounds away.

Bella. Bella had told him to go save his father. She almost looked more worried than he was. And Damian always hated seeing Bella worried. He had to go to his father. Not only for his safety, but for Bella's sanity. As much as Damian loved his father, he was beginning to realize that he might just care for Bella the tiniest bit more. The least he could do was be there at her birthday.

It took a day to get back to the village. Philippe was heaving and warm, but Damian spurred him on.

"Just a little more, boy," Damian murmured. Of course he felt bad, Philippe wasn't used to so much riding all at once, but it needed to be done. If it took a day to get from the castle back here, Damian needed to start going back within the next day to make it back to the castle before Bella's castle.

Damian pulled out the mirror Bella had given to him. Before he asked it to show him his father, Damian simply looked at it.

In a way, it reminded him of Bella. On the outside, it was ugly. The actual mirror was protected with a cracked gray frame, and there were a few chip marks along the handle. It was dirty, and obviously old, and a few months ago, if Damian had seen it, he would have thrown it away or left it alone. But, for all that was lacking in its appearance, it was amazing. Bella had shown him that the mirror had more inside of it than its outside had led him to believe. He had just needed to look a little closer.

"Show me my father," Damian told it. Just like with Bella, the surface clouded over, then cleared, showing him Gerard Labarre. He wasn't just bundled in a ball like before; he was looking somewhere, at someone.

Damian pulled Philippe's reins, giving him a well-deserved rest, while Damian focused on where his father was. Maybe he could discern some clues. If only he could see more…

"Show me more," Damian commanded. The mirror obliged. It took a second, and Damian squirmed uncomfortably in the saddle. He needed to know now!

The mirror finally cleared again, and Damian looked closely at the setting, trying to figure out if he saw anything familiar about that tree, those boxes, that... brick wall...

Damian kicked Philippe to a fast canter through the town. The second Damian was in front of the pub, he leaped off of Philippe. His father was around here somewhere...

Genevieve was outside the front doors, pacing back and forth, back and forth. Not giving himself enough time to think about what he was about to do, Damian walked briskly to Genevieve, shoulders tensed, jaw clenched, brow furrowed,

"Genevieve," Damian said icily. He barely gave her enough time to look surprised. "Where is my father?" At Genevieve's blank stare, Damian growled under breath, but pushed on, "The man who gave you food when he couldn't afford any for himself? Who helped you hide from the especially pushy suitors? Who was genuinely kind to you? Where is he!?"

Genevieve stayed silent, still just looking Damian over. Damian exclaimed in frustration. There was no question about who had ordered his father to be locked up. He had seen Genevieve 'request' her faithful followers to do much worse without even batting an eye. If anyone deserved to be called a monster, it would be Genevieve, not Bella.

Bella had a heart. She looked out for others, and she cared for them. She did her best, and she worked hard, which made her who she was. Genevieve, on the other hand, cared only for herself, and never needed to do anything. She had fleets of men at her beck and call, just waiting for her command.

"Where have you been?"

Damian rolled his eyes. Of course Genevieve would completely ignore anything he had said. He ran his hands through his hair, trying to calm down. No matter how angry he was with her, there was no way he would ever hit a woman. If he ever did that, he would never be able to face himself again. And worse, he would never be able to face Bella again.

"Why does it matter? I need to know why you had my father locked up while I was away. He was a part of this village! Doesn't that mean anything to you? Of course it doesn't, you don't care about anyone but yourself!" Damian couldn't control his temper, and at the end he started shouting, drawing a small amount of attention from inside the pub. A few lonely drunks stumbled out, wondering what was going on.

"Do you honestly believe that? Do you really think that I would lock up your father if I didn't really think he was crazy?" to Damian's surprise, Genevieve sounded sincerely hurt. Her eyes shone with tears, and her neck was beginning to turn red, like it always did before Genevieve cried. She took a deep breath and continued with a wobbly voice, which slowly steadied, "Damian, I know this is hard to accept, but Mr. Labarre is old. He came back to town, telling us all that you were with another girl, after you clearly had the option of marrying me. And then, his story got even more unbelievable! He said that the girl was half reptile, half _wolf_, and half… half devil! He's not right, Damian. It's time to accept that your old man-"

"He's not crazy!" Damian argued. "I was with another girl, one a hundred times better than you at _least_! And she did look like that!"

More people from the pub came straggling out, trying to hear the argument. No one ever went against Genevieve, but once in an odd blue moon, someone challenged her. It was always interesting to see the outcome.

"Are you crazy, too?" Genevieve asked softly, a couple of perfect tears falling from her perfect blue eyes. She reached towards his face with her hand, but stopped a couple of inches short, like she was afraid to touch him. "But… no!" She was starting to get louder, and more people filed out of the pub. "No! I just got you, and now you're… you can't be crazy! It's not fair!" she was outright screaming, and Damian was red in the face with anger. How dare she call him _and_ his father crazy? What right did she have to make that call? Where was Monsieur D'Arc? He owed Damian a favor, and could certainly pay Damian back by setting his father free.

"We're not crazy, and I can prove it!"

Damian whistled Philippe closer and grabbed Bella's mirror from his saddle bag.

"Show me Bella!" he cried. The mirror clouded over, and when it cleared, Bella was there, sans her dress. The entire village looked to the mirror, looks of disgusted fascination on their faces, until Genevieve laughed.

"That's cute," she said. "You invented a moving picture? How am I to trust a… what is this supposed to be? A magic mirror? Really, Damian, are you that far off the edge?"

It was only because Damian had known her for so long that he heard the distinct sadness in her usually flippant voice.

"It _is_ a magic mirror," Damian said, matter-of-factly. "And I'll prove it, too," Damian looked around for a little bit of inspiration. "Show me the inside of the pub,"

A couple of seconds later, the bartender and his barmaids were shown, as well as a couple of drunk men, lying unconscious on the ground.

"François!" Damian called to the bookshop keeper, "Go inside,"

He did so, after a curious look, and the entire congregation in front of Damian gasped. The constant smug look Genevieve had worn so far faded away. In the mirror, François was shown walking in, looking around for a second, and then coming back outside. Before the mirror showed him stepping out of the pub, everyone turned to look at the doors. François stepped out, and Damian declared,

"See? We're not crazy! Now let my father go!"

"Hold on a second," Genevieve called before any of the men could make a move to free his father. She strut over to Damian and snatched the mirror from his hands. "That monster is real?"

"What monster?" Damian asked, confused. He usually wasn't, and he hated the feeling.

"Show me the beast!" Genevieve called, and the mirror clouded over. When it cleared, a wave of cold fear washed over Damian, and he paled.

"H-hold on! She's not dangerous! I know her, and she's kind, and patient, and just as much of a person as any of us!"

"_She?_ Damian, this thing is a monster!" Genevieve started to address the crowd, "Look at it! See its claws? Its teeth? Its obvious connection with the devil? We have to get rid of it!"

A couple of people were hesitant, and a low rumble of uneasy mumbling started filling the air. Genevieve got a wicked gleam in her eyes, and Damian knew he had to speak before she did.

"No! If you go rushing to her doorstep with fire and pitchforks, of course she'll attack, but if we leave her alone, she won't harm any of us!"

"Who told you that, Damian?" Genevieve asked condescendingly. "The beast?"

"Her name is Bella, and no, she didn't. I know her, and I know that she wouldn't hurt a soul, not even yours, Genevieve," Damian turned to the rest of the townspeople; the people he had known since he was a small boy. "Please," he begged, "Leave her be, she won't come out to provoke us on her own. Just leave her be!"

"How can we?" Genevieve snarled. She held the mirror higher, and started very nearly shouting, "This monster will come after your children, your women, your neighbors! It'll come after _me!_ Would you, the strong men of our village, really just let it go? We need to exterminate it before it kills all of us!"

Damian knew he was in trouble the second Genevieve sent a wink at Louis. The boy had been pining after Genevieve for as long as anyone could remember, and would do anything for her. Even setting a mob after Bella.

"We have to kill it! Kill the beast!" Louis cried. Damian's heart sank. Genevieve had power, of course she did, but she was still a woman. If it had been just her that Damian was fighting against, Damian would have calmed the crowd down in a few more seconds. But then, Louis just had to but in.

"No!"

"Kill it! Kill the beast!" Benjamin yelled, and Damian knew that the crowd would be going after Bella. One man against one man gave each side a fair shot. Two men plus Genevieve against Damian was no challenge at all. The only chance he had now was to get to his father, free him, and then rush to warn Bella, and he had to do it all before the village noticed him trying to do anything out of the ordinary.

He stepped down from the wooden box he had jumped onto, trying to be as inconspicuous as possible.

"Hey, where are you going, traitor?" Andre asked, roughly dragging Damian back into the spotlight by his shoulder. Damian angrily shrugged Andre's arm off of him. Andre tried to force Damian back, stepping closer to the younger man, but Damian stood his ground, and when Andre got too closer, Damian pushed him away.

"I'm still a citizen of this town. Is there a law against walking on the ground?" Damian ground out, after Andre pushed him back.

"No, but there is a law against freeing a convicted insane person. We know you, Damian. Don't even pretend that you weren't going to free your father," Genevieve said condescendingly.

"So what if I was? Someone has to watch after my father!" Damian shot back, and Genevieve's face crumpled. If she had been almost anyone else, Damian would have felt bad, but she wasn't, so Damian felt not an ounce of pity.

"Lock him up," her voice was chilly. There was not a single emotion in her eyes, and that scared Damian more than Bella had when he had first met her.

"Get off of me!" Damian yelled when Alfonse and Marcel latched onto his arms. They started dragging him away, but Damian didn't stop struggling once. Alfonse finally let go of his arm, only for Marcel to grab it, and then throw him in a large wooden box a second later.

Damian tried to stand up, but hit his head on the low roof. He grabbed his head and bit out a curse. He fell to his knees and tried to pull on the wooden bars. When he realized it was useless, he angrily hit the side of the cage he was in, and then he sighed. What had he done? All he had wanted to do was free his father, but he somehow ended up ensuring that the person who understood him most in the world was going to be killed. His head hung low, and he pressed his forehead against the bars in front of him.

"Damian?" a rough, weathered voice asked from behind him. Damian spun around so fast that he hit his head on the roof of the cell again.

"Ah!" he held his head in his hands, but looked up a second later, desperately needing to know if what he heard was real. "Dad?"

At least his rescue mission hadn't been a complete waste of time.

**I got six reviews! And three follows and favorites! I'm just so happy! Anyway, we're about halfway through this thing now, and I'm super excited to see the way it all comes together. I've got all the chapters planned out, but it'll be a bit of a struggle for me to write them all. If you have any constructive criticism, that'd be awesome. Any plain old 'oh, i liked it!' those are awesome, too! So, I'll definitely be posting at least one chapter a week, maybe more. It depends on the chapter. Anyway, thanks for all of y'alls support and stuff. :)**


	11. Hospitality

**Chapter 11**

**Bella**

Bella lay on the floor of her bedroom, not caring about the multitudes of things she was bound to be crushing underneath her. She didn't care that the floor was uncomfortable. She didn't care that she had just ripped her favorite dress off. She didn't even care than Chip was still awake, not asleep like he was supposed to be. All she was focused on was not crying. She couldn't. She had no right to.

It had been her choice to send Damian away. She just wanted Gerard safe… Why did things always end up going bad for her when she was just trying to help people? No matter how hard she tried, or how many people she helped, Bella always got the short end of the stick. Well, until she met Gerard.

She had helped him, became his friend, and ended up falling in love with his son. But then, she had sent said son away. He had been her last chance at happiness. Her last chance at turning her staff human again. Her last chance to redeem herself.

She tried to convince herself that she made a mistake, that Gerard could have lasted four more days. But, that's what made her feel even more repulsed with herself. She didn't regret it. She had seen the way Gerard was being kept. In a wooden crate, like an animal. If anyone deserved treatment, it was her. Definitely not Gerard, who was probably the kindest man on the face of the planet. He was the first human to see and accept her, and to try to be her friend. No matter how many times Bella thought about it, she knew she could have never left Gerard there to rot, even if it cost her staff their humanity.

"Bella?" Chip asked softly. Her staff- her loyal, wonderful staff- was surrounding her. Lumiere had gotten someone, a knife or spoon probably, to carve a worried frown on his face. But even without that, Bella would have been able to tell that everyone was upset.

They had all seen Bella leading Damian out, all heard her scaring the wolves away, all felt the hopelessness as they saw him riding away. So, why were they surrounding her, so kindly, right now?

Bella looked at them all. Even after she cost them everything they ever wanted, they were here for her. That was it. Bella lost it.

First came one tear, then another. She hiccuped, again and again, until they turned into sobs. She curled into a ball on the floor, trying to keep her disgraceful face from her staff.

They weren't even really just her staff anymore. They had been there for her through her highs and her lows. They fed her and cared for her and made sure she was better than the angry, spiteful person she could have easily become. They were her… family.

"I'm so… sorry!" she sobbed, her voice muffled by the sheets and her paws covering her face. "I'm so-sorry! So sorry!"

"Mistress, what's wrong?"

"Please, don't call me that!" she moaned at Lumiere, and for a second, his fire wavered. He hopped forward, asking urgently,

"Please, Bella, what is wrong?"

Bella couldn't speak for a few moments, simply sobbing and sucking in the air she needed to live. She wondered mournfully if she even deserved it. Maybe she should stop wasting air and just hold her breath forever and ever.

"I'm sorry!" She choked out again. "I told him to- to go! Ge-Gerard was sick, and-and," she took a moment to try to compose herself. She started whispering, "I sent Damian to help him. Even after all you did for me, I told him to go. I'm so sorry!"

She curled into herself again, sure they would all hate her now, and leave her like everyone did. Mrs. Potts clanked forward, and said gently,

"Darling, we're not the only losers here. Or did you forget that you would also be turned human? Bella, you're the one who's lying on the floor, heartbroken. Stop worrying about us for a second. We're fine, truly. It's you who isn't,"

Bella whimpered and slowly unfurled. She looked at her… family. She took a shaky breath and said softly,

"You're the best family anyone could ever wish for,"

Lumiere's flame lit, and Cogsworth's hour hand froze as his minute hand spun out of control. Bella let out a small grin. They were blushing.

Bella sat up, and held out her arms. Her whole family crowded onto her large body, and they just stayed there for a while, the quiet and calm a comfort to Bella. She was just about to start falling asleep when she heard a knock on the door. She was jolted from the quiet trance she was in and stood up, making sure no one was hurt during their drop to the ground.

She walked to the main entrance, momentarily forgetting about her appearance. Being around Damian had made her more confident. She didn't hate her appearance anymore. She almost felt… beautiful when Damian was around her, looking at her like that. She shook her head. She couldn't think of him anymore. There was no way he was ever coming back.

Bella loped to the front door, and opened it just as a man was about to knock again. She looked at the group of men before stepping aside, saying,

"Come in,"

They looked at her warily, and Bella tried to push the hurt in her chest down. She was not a monster, as Damian and her family had been reminding her. She could host a company.

"Please, come in and get comfortable. I'll go tell the chef to prepare some food, and I'll be right back to seat you all,"

The men looked at each other before shuffling inside. They all looked at the floor until one man was brave enough to look up. He gasped, and all the other men were immediately on guard. They raised their pitchforks and fire-prodders, but immediately lowered them when they saw what the man was looking at.

Bella turned to where they were staring. It was her front entrance, same as it had always been. It came to Bella that the men were probably poor village folk. Most likely farmers, judging by their dusty and dirty attire. She thought it better to not bring their lack of knowledge of castles to attention, and instead said,

"Please, get comfortable. I'll be right back,"

Bella went to the chef and called to him,

"Jean-Pierre,"

"Oui, Madame?" the stove asked.

"I have a company of farmers out in our sitting area. I think we need a feast fit for a good group of hungry men. Please, have it ready in fifteen minutes,"

"Oui, Madame," He nodded, and then started yelling orders around the kitchen, and Bella left before it got to be too chaotic.

"Hello again," she greeted her guests. "Please, follow me," she invited them. A couple of them tightened their grips on their weapons, but Bella tried to push the thought out of her mind. She led them to her dining room, and seated each man individually.

"And you, Monsieur, do you like meat?"

"Well… erm, no, not particularly, no," the man said, coughing awkwardly. Bella simply nodded agreeably.

"Well, we usually place the meats here, the vegetables here, and the fruits way down over there. Please, follow me and I'll see to it that you are seated by a food you would like,"

"A-alright,"

The men all seemed so surprised by her hospitality. Bella chose to feel happy that she exceeded their expectations, rather than dwell on the fact that they probably thought her to be a monster before they stepping into her castle, and had wanted to kill her.

The second she had all the men seated, her staff came out, carrying plates upon plates of food. The men all gaped at it before Bella gently encouraged,

"It's not poisonous. Please, you are all my guests, I insist you eat,"

The men needed no further encouragement. Bella looked at the man who didn't like meat.

"Monsieur?" She asked. The man turned to look at her. "Is… is everything satisfactory?" It took everything in Bella to not growl the question out. Damian had once told her that if she growled, she would make anyone around her frightened. And more than anything, Bella didn't want anyone to be uncomfortable because of her.

To her immense relief, the man smiled and said,

"Yes, thank you Madame,"

All the men looked at him before they kept eating. Bella racked her brain, thinking of any subject to interest the men.

"How are the crops this year?" she asked. Most of the men kept eating, but a few turned to look at her. All of their weapons were lying on the ground, and Bella's staff dutifully picked them up and closed them in a closet. "The last I heard, potatoes were doing well, and that peas were all but dead when they were planted. But, that was a couple of years ago. Has anything changed?"

"Well, erm… yes," one of the men said, licking his fingers free of a meaty gravy. "Potatoes are doing fine, but we're mainly planting corn these days,"

"Yeah, that would make sense," Bella nodded, "You don't need a whole lot of seeds, but you get a lot of product. Very filling. Nutritious,"

All the men looked at her, and Bella squirmed in her seat, and her tail flicked on the ground next to one man's feet. She looked around, then asked,

"Am I talking about the wrong type of corn?"

"Excuse me, Madame, but I wasn't exactly expecting someone… like you to understand,"

Bella sighed sadly, and her ears drooped as she looked at the empty plate in front of her. She nodded.

"I understand," her voice trembled, "You all think that I'm just a monster who wants to kill everything,"

She looked up at the men. They had all stopped eating, and were staring at her. She stood up abruptly.

"I'm sorry!" She apologized. "It seems that I'm making you uncomfortable. Please, eat. And when you're done, my staff can guide you to a room you can spend the night in. You can stay as long as you like. Just stay out of the…" Bella trailed off. They had already seen her. There really was no point in them staying out of the east wing for them. Bella bit the inside of her cheek and winced at the taste of blood that filled her mouth. She started walking out the doors.

"Please, don't go, Madame!" one of the men called out. Bella turned around, and saw all the men staring at the man who didn't like meat.

"You're not making us uncomfortable," another man confirmed, and everyone moved to look at him.

"We were just surprised that something who lives in a castle as fine as this one would know anything about corn,"

"Oh!" Bella was confused. She gingerly sat down again and said, "Well, I am supposed to the Lady of all the land around here. I ought to know what kinds of plants to grow, and why," The men looked at her. She tilted her head to the side. "What?"

"You own… all the land here?"

"From three miles north of here to eighteen miles south. Who do you think pays the land taxes for you? And why do you think that the king's men never come here? This is my land, and even if I never let anyone see me, I make sure to do my job,"

After that, the men suddenly grew silent.

"Genevieve Fleour and her father have always said that they do that," one man said. Bella closed her eyes and tilted her head back, trying to think. Fleour…

"Sorry," Bella said, shrugging her shoulders, "I've never heard of the Fleours. But I'm sure you've heard of the Casteouxs?" All of the men nodded, and Bella revealed, "I'm their last living heir. My name is Belladonna Casteoux,"

The men all stiffened. One man asked, slowly,

"You're a Casteoux?"

Bella looked down sadly.

"I don't look like it anymore, do I? An enchantress cursed me to look like this, but make no mistake. I am Belladonna Casteoux. But please, call me Bella,"

The men were silent for a second before one man said angrily,

"Well then, those Fleours owe me a good twelve pieces!"

That started the conversation again, and Bella was glad that her presence wasn't a hindrance to them.

Another knock sounded at the front door, and only Bella's sharp wolf ears heard it. She started standing up, still laughing slightly at something Germaine had said.

"Where are you going, Bella?" Antoine asked.

"Didn't I tell you that you weren't bothering us?" Bella smiled at François's concern.

"Please don't leave!" Philippe begged her. Bella chuckled a little and said,

"I'm not leaving. I think some more of your friends are here. They're pounding quite relentlessly on the door. I'm just going to let them in,"

"NO!" all the men said at once, and Bella jumped clear out of her skin.

"Why not?" she yelped, looking between all the men in her dining room.

"Please," Benjamin said, "Just trust us. You don't want to let those men into your home,"

Feeling slightly uneasy, Bella agreed and sat down again at the table. Still, she couldn't shake the feeling that there was something her guests weren't telling her.


	12. Getting Inside

**Chapter 12**

**Genevieve/Gerard**

Genevieve paced in front of the wooden doors, rubbing her hands together. It was cold outside. So, so cold. But Genevieve couldn't afford to focus on that. The only thing preventing her from being with Damian was in that castle, and she couldn't rest until that monster was killed.

"I told you that the monster wouldn't just… _open _its doors if we knocked!" Genevieve tried her hardest to keep from shouting. She still remembered that the last time she had yelled. Damian had been right there. She had felt so embarrassed when she had turned around, only to find Damian gone. Genevieve had sworn since then that she was never again going to scream or shout.

"It's just common courtesy, Ms. Flouer," Charmont said, smiling dreamily at her. Genevieve mentally rolled her eyes, but out loud she said in a biting voice,

"Well, why don't we just explain common courtesy to the beast inside the castle? You know, the one who's probably feasting on François's flesh, while roasting Benjamin's kidney, and drinking Germaine's blood!"

Genevieve huffed out a short breath to calm herself. It had taken all night to get the mob of buffoons to the castle, even _with_ her navigating via the magic mirror.

Speaking of which, Genevieve pulled out the ugly mirror. She stared at the shiny surface, not surprised anymore that her reflection wasn't looking back at her. Her heart ached to see Damian. She wanted to see his face, his hair, his smile.

She hadn't seen him for months, and the day he came back, she had to lock him up to kill the monster he talked of so fondly. Why didn't he see? She was just doing it for his own benefit. It wasn't like she was doing what she was doing just to hurt him. She just wanted them to be together. Blame a girl for loving a boy.

Genevieve put the mirror back in her horse's saddle bag. She turned to the men, still murmuring uneasily to each other. They were already scared. Now, Genevieve only needed to give them a little push and they would be putty in her hands. Then they would kill the beast. Then Damian would finally open his eyes to the beauty that had been in front of him the whole time. Then they would get married. Then they would be happy. Then this entire nightmare would just be a story they could laugh at while they were watching their grandchildren play in their front yard.

"Do you really want to let that monster win?" she wasn't yelling. No. Genevieve was projecting, still as beautiful and lady-like as ever. "Are you going to walk back home, to your fellow villagers and say that you failed to kill the monster that's plaguing this land? And why? Because it wouldn't _open its doors_ for you? I think not!" A few of the men were starting to nod. Genevieve grinned. She almost had them. One last thing… "This is _our_ land! This beast is on _our _home! I say we take it back! Now who's with me?"

All the men raised their weapons and cheered. Genevieve didn't have time to feel victorious. She turned to the burliest men and ordered them to cut down a tree.

"But, why, Mademoiselle?" Marcel asked. Genevieve smiled thinly at him, remembering the rough way he handled Damian earlier.

"_Because_," Genevieve tried not to let her obvious disdain for Marcel show, but she had a feeling that she wasn't doing too wonderful of a job. "We're going to ram the door down,"

And that's what they did. The actual cutting down of the tree took a lot longer than Genevieve had anticipated. The men grew too tired to finish the job at night, so the entire company settled for waiting until morning to complete the job.

"Alright, now trim off the extra branches, and make sure the bark is smooth," Genevieve said soothingly, touching some of the men's shoulders lightly. She pouted slightly and said, "I can't have any of my men staying out of battle because of a splinter, now, can I?"

They all nodded eagerly and went straight to work. Genevieve turned her back to them and rolled her eyes.

_Men_. She thought. _So easy. _

"We're ready, Mademoiselle," Bernard announced. Genevieve looked up at the sky. It was almost twilight. Genevieve frowned at the amount of time it took them, but said airily,

"Very good! Now, hoist it up onto your strong shoulders. When we hit those doors down, that beast will finally get what it has deserved for years,"

Bernard grinned at her, and Genevieve's heart longed to see Damian looking at her like that. With warmth in his eyes instead of cold calculation. With a light blush on his face instead of a frown. With a heavy amount of adoration weighing down on him, not the desire to get away. Genevieve stiffened. She wanted Damian to look at her like he looked when he was talking about the beast! Genevieve was outraged! She projected to her men, who were still trying to bring the front doors down,

"Harder! We need to get inside! Put your backs into it!"

And with one final _boom_ resonating through the castle, the doors were down. Genevieve licked her lips and took a few tentative steps inside before pausing in confusion, the rest of the men from the village following suit. No one said it, but Genevieve could swear they all were thinking the same thing:

_Where was everyone?_

* * *

Gerard coughed into his tatted blanket before rasping,

"Pass me some more beef son."

Gerard had had to stop himself from whimpering in pleasure at the taste of the thick, hardy food. It had seemed like lifetimes ago that he had stayed in the comforts of Bella's castle. Now he was in a wooden crate with his less-than-lively son, and a terrible cough hacking at his lungs every couple of seconds.

"Sorry, Old Man," his son sighed. "There's no more,"

"We finished it all?" Gerard couldn't stop the disappointment from leaking through his words any more than he could stop his stomach from rumbling.

"Yeah. Bella didn't exactly think that I'd end up stuck in a cage, too. She thought that I would come marching in here, get you out, and then we would both go back to her. You know, it's her birthday in two days? She still insisted that I come and save you," Damian leaned his head back against the wall he was sitting against. "I haven't even _heard_ of a girl like her before: so selfless, so kind. She's one of a kind, Dad. One of a kind,"

Gerard's brain poked at him. Damian had said something. Something important. _Birthday_. The word lingered in the back of Gerard's mind until it all clicked into place. Straightening his tired back, Gerard asked,

"Damian, would you happen to know which birthday she is having?"

"Hmm?" Damian asked, his eyes closed. "It's her twenty-first. Isn't that odd to think? That Bella's just a year younger than me?"

Gerard felt like he couldn't breathe. It was a days' journey to get to their village. Bella ought to have known that. It was her _twenty-first_ birthday. There was no way she could have forgotten that! Why would she have done this? Why…

Gerard stole a glance at his son. On the surface, it looked as if the young man was trying to sleep. But, Gerard knew his son too well. He saw how his eyebrows pushed together slightly. He saw how Damian's arm muscles tensed at every little sound. He saw how his jaw was clenched and he heard how unnaturally heavy his breathing was.

"Son," Gerard said softly, "Tell a stubborn old man: why are you upset?"

"I'm not upset," Damian ground out. Gerard couldn't help but to laugh. And when he did, he started coughing. Each cough was like a spire of ice being lodged inside of his lungs. Within an instant of Gerard's doubling over in pain, Damian was right there next to him. The young man held onto his father's shoulders, and Gerard felt a swell of affection for him.

"Yes you are," Gerard said gently. "Now tell me why. Would you, Son?"

"Well… it's just about Bella," Damian admitted, leaning against one of the walls again. "She was so kind to me- to us! She gave us food, and was patient with me, and helped me. She talked to me, and she… understood me. She sent me away from the one birthday she was going to be celebrating in ten years, so that I could save you. And what do I do to repay her? I was rude to her, and scared her, and now I've all but killed her!" Damian shut his eyes, but Gerard could still see the tear escaping down his cheek. "They're going to kill her, and there will never be another Bella in the world. There is only one, and I…"

_He loves her_ Gerard realized with a starts. He blinked, and smiled as he thought, _He loves her! He loves her! He'll break her curse, and I'll finally have my grandchildren!_

It warmed Gerard's heart to see the way Damian talked about Bella. He knew firsthand that Bella was a little… socially isolated. Even so, she was lovely. A lovely girl with a sad tale behind her. Gerard didn't understand _how_ exactly, but she had overcome her misgivings, and had grown up to be a rather remarkable young woman. And it genuinely amazed Gerard that his son had seen that as well. Damian... wasn't exactly known for his patience.

His son was in a lot of ways, almost like an opposite of Bella. While Damian didn't particularly like socializing all the time, when he was out with other people, Damian was able to get along remarkably well with them. That, coupled with his son's unending cheerfulness and caring attitude made Gerard believe that if the two of them ever chose to lead a life together, they would do wonderfully well.

Where Bella was shy and a little unsure, Damian was outgoing and confident. And where Damian was a little clumsy and hot-headed, Bella was elegant and ever calm.

The two completely complimented each other, and Gerard found himself smiling in the dark. He honestly was happy for his son and hopefully-soon-to-be-daughter-in-law. Both of them had led rough lives, and Gerard only wanted happiness and smooth sailings for them from then on.

But first things first. Gerard needed to get Damian out of there. Gerard slowly stood up, and Damian tracked him with his eyes curiously.

"You need to go to her," Gerard said using the firmest voice he ever had with his son. "Before it's too late."

**I thought that when I planned this story out it had 20 chapters, but when I started uploading it onto the site, something felt off, like it was missing. So, I did a little digging and found this little gem- the original chapter 12! Haha, I can't believe I've now forgotten about two chapters. That's embarrassing. Oh well, hopefully things make a little more sense now, if they didn't already. I still love follows, favorites, and reviews :)**


	13. No Fighting

**Chapter 13**

**Bella**

Bella was embarrassed. Her room was a complete mess. Her sheets, mattress, and a whole array of other things littering the ground. The paint on her walls was peeling, and broken mirrors and ripped paintings lined the walls. The air in her room smelled like dust, and almost _felt _gray. Overall, her room was lacking a basic standard of cleanliness. She was fine with it when she was alone, but right then, she wasn't alone. In fact, she was less alone than she had been in ten years.

Her guests had heard someone knocking on her door last night, and had insisted that they all hide. Bella's family had immediately sensed their urgency and had led the men to her room. _Without her permission. _

None of them had anything about the condition of the room, but Bella's face burned with shame. She had never been so grateful for the fur covering her body.

They had all filed into the room, and had stayed packed in the room all night. The room was stuffy and uncomfortable, and it smelled like the sweat of thirty men who had slept on their feet. Bella had predicted that the men would stink up her room, however, and she had moved towards her balcony as soon as she had entered the room. Her family had made their way to her, and now they were all huddled together.

There was an uneasy silence, as everyone felt something change in the air. All the persons in the room tensed, waiting for a development to occur.

_Bang!_

Everyone jumped, and Chip leapt into Bella's arms. She cradled him gently while creeping onto her balcony to peer down at the ground. She couldn't quite comprehend what she was seeing. There was a second company of men, ramming a log into her front doors. Were those men from the party of people who had wanted to come in yesterday? The people who her current guests seemed so afraid of? Why were they trying to hard to get into her house?

"Bella?" Antoine asked nervously. "What was that?"

All the men in her room looked at her expectantly, and Bella wished that she had Damian next to her.

It had been such a long time since she had talked to a group of people, let alone been a leader to them. The last time she had made a decision in front of a multitude she was responsible for, she had gotten them transformed into inanimate objects. Who said that Bella had matured any? Who said that she was the most qualified to make these major decisions for them?

At least if Damian was with her, he would have looked at her with his impossibly handsome face, with his impossibly dark eyes, and given her an encouraging smile. He would have squeezed her arm, and just by being next to her, he would have given her enough confidence to say something. _Anything. _

Before she had a chance to piece together a thought or two, Germaine spoke up,

"Why, we fight, of course!"

"Fight?" Bella asked. "Why?"

"Mademoiselle, do you honestly think that they'll let you live if you don't fight for your castle? For your freedom?" François asked.

Bella stopped to think. If she died, then she wouldn't have to live there in that dreadful castle anymore. She wouldn't have to wake up, knowing exactly what she was, and why. She wouldn't have to carry the heavy burden of guilt for the rest of her life. She wouldn't have to endure an eternity of pain, waiting for Damian to come back.

Bella wasn't stupid. She had practically thrown Damian out of her castle. He was going to go free his father, and then he was going to make sure his father was cared for. He would personally see to Gerard's recovery, and in doing so, he would forget all about Bella. But, Bella would never have that luxury.

If she lived, she would be in constant heartache. If the past three days were anything to go by, then Bella would rather have death than life without Damian. She would rather die than know that she would never see the man she loved ever again.

"No," Bella said, her tail flicking on the ground like a whip.

"Then, we will fight, Bella," Lumiere said. Cogsworth hobbled next to his candelabrum friend.

"That's right. We obviously have the advantage. We can create a battle plan, and spread out strategically throughout the castle! They'll never see us-"

"No," Bella said, firmly this time. "We will not fight,"

"But… but Bella-" Lumiere tried to say, but Bella cut him off.

"What's the point?" her voice cracked, but she didn't care. "If I survive, what's the point?"

Bella tried to imagine life without Damian. She couldn't. It would be as gray and lifeless as the stone walls she was surrounded by. If she survived after today, and she never saw Damian again, wouldn't she just turn bitter and ugly? Wouldn't she just turn into the exact animal which the enchantress transformed her into?

"Darling, think about what you're saying," Mrs. Potts started to say. Bella rounded on her and said,

"I _am. _I'm being serious right now! If I am alive after today, what would happen? Damian would stay in his village, with Gerard. They would be safe and happy, and I would be in this castle. You would be my family, and try to pull me back from my bitterness and anger, but I wouldn't be able to be saved! Mrs. Potts, I love him! I am _in love_ with him! And I just know that he's going to stay with his father until Gerard is healed; that's the man I fell in love with. By the time he comes back- if he comes back, mind you- I won't even be able to love myself! He'll see that, and he'll run away again, and I'll go crazy!"

Bella looked around her room. She saw the familiar silhouettes of her family by her ankles, and the friendly faces of some of Damian's fellow villagers. She couldn't let them die for her. She couldn't let anyone else suffer because of her choices.

"Stay here," Bella sighed, and started moving towards the door. "Even if you hear any yelling, don't move from this spot,"

"Mademoiselle," Benjamin said, tugging on the cloak Bella had started wrapping around herself. "What exactly are you planning?"

Bella chuckled humorlessly.

"They wanted a beast, yes?" The men around her nodded uneasily. "They're my guests. I must do everything I can to give them what they want," Bella looked at the tired and worried faces in her room. "I can't let you get hurt because of me," Bella confessed silently. "My choices should not impact you. Please," she pleaded, "Stay here. Stay safe,"

She started moving towards the door again, but as one, the men she had turned her back towards surged forward and pulled her back. Bella opened her mouth, starting to ask them what in the world they thought they were doing, but François gagged her with a piece of a ripped bed sheet that he found on the ground. She tried to struggle out of their grips without hurting them, but it was difficult. They were all farmers, used to working the land. In other words, all of them were strong men, all in their primes, and Bella could only struggle so much without risking injuring any of them.

They dragged her towards her bed frame and pushed her down onto it. Bella was starting to become afraid, and she struggled more, but the men were already one step ahead of her. Antoine and Leon tied her hands down to the top bedposts while Germaine and Raymond secured her ankles to the bottom of the frame. She thrashed around, and Benjamin apologized,

"I'm so sorry, Mademoiselle,"

"But you've been doing us many great services for years," Germaine grunted as he tied a couple of hard knots with the sheet he was using to secure Bella to the bed.

"We can't in good conscious know that we let them kill you when you've done nothing but good for us. Sorry, Mademoiselle," Bella tried to call to Leon, telling him to let her go, but he ignored her and continued, "Now you're all tied down. If we get hurt when we go down to fight for you, it'll be our choice, not yours,"

Bella tried to tell them to just let her go; to let her face her fate. But all the men turned and ignored her. She pulled at her restraints. They were going to get hurt! Why didn't they understand? Bella felt tears stinging at her eyes. These men were so nice to her, and now they were going to get hurt. Why did everyone who got close to Bella end up getting hurt? Maybe it was a good thing for Damian to stay away before he got hurt, too. After all, Gerard had been her friend, and he had ended up sick, and thrown in a wooden crate, like an animal on display.

"We do hope you'll be able to forgive us, Bella," Jacque said. "Please understand that we're doing this for you,"

Then all the men turned and left the room with her family. Bella stopped struggling for a second. They were actually going to do it.

She started fighting harder than ever. Her muscles burned, and her wrists began to feel raw. After a couple of minutes of struggling with her restraints, Bella fell against the wooden frame. Her tail flickered with annoyance. Bella closed her eyes, and her tail skimmed the dirty floor again, making an eerie scraping noise. Bella's eyes snapped open. Her tail!

She brought it to her left hand and started trying to untie the knots with the tip of her tail and the edges of her claws. She groaned lowly in frustration as she got the first of the many knots there untangled.

She hadn't been this angry in a while. Even when Damian had tried to touch her rose, she had not felt this much anger. The amount of pure rage which she was experiencing actually scared Bella to a degree. She started growling as she worked. When she got down to them, those men had better run. Because Bella was not in a mood to be trifled with.

**About seven more chapters! I'm excited, I'm almost done, and it's been great. I know that BatB stories can be boring and repetitive, and I just really didn't want to have a story like that. I'll try to finish quickly, but I still want my stories to have quality to them, and I have another story that I'm working on right now, so I have to give that one time as well. Thanks for reading this far, and favoriting, following, reviewing :)**


	14. Escaping and Entering

**Before the chapter, I want to explain Bella's actions in the last chapter. The past couple of chapters with her in them were like a giant emotional roller coaster for her, and she had been slowly going up, waiting for her tension to get the better of her. First she sees the love of her life ride away, and she honestly thinks that he'll never come back. Then, just when she's feeling all alone, she realizes that her staff was her family, and that they would always be there for her. And then the guests come, and she feels so surrounded by people, that she kind of gets almost overwhelmed. It's like, when you leave home for the first time. It's amazing, but you also have the underlying feeling of anxiety. For Bella, when she was put in a position where her choice would impact everyone around her, it was kind of like her breaking point. The chapter ended with her emotions crashing from that cliché sudden drop on the roller coaster. Don't worry, though. The next time you see Bella, she'll be angry, but then she'll go back to being the Bella everyone knows and loves. :) (btw, like always, thanks for reviewing, favoriting, and following)**

* * *

**Chapter 14**

**Damian/Genevieve**

"What? Dad, I can't just leave you here!" Damian protested. The old man let out a sigh, as if he was preparing to tell Damian some news that would be difficult to absorb.

"Son, I'll be fine. I've survived worse. If you don't go, they _will_ kill her,"

The thought struck Damian like a shard of ice in his chest. He could feel his heart stop for a second, trying to wrap his mind around the fact that a dead Bella could be a reality in a few hours. His stomach churned as he realized that it was his fault that it was a real possibility for her beautiful body to be spread on the ground, surrounded by a pool of blood. Damian shook the thought away. He couldn't deal with those types of thoughts right then.

"Ok," Damian agreed, "So, we need to get out. How?"

"_You_ need to get out," corrected his father. "I wouldn't do much except slow you down. I can find my way back to our house when we break out of here,"

Damian wanted to argue, but he knew, deep down inside, that his father was right. Damian furrowed his brow, and said,

"I don't like it, but you're right. Still, that leaves the question: how will we get out of here?"

"Shhh!" his father hushed, gesturing to the guard right outside their cell. "Just go announce it to the whole village, why don't you?"

Damian ran a hand through his hair and blew out a breath.

"Ok," he mumbled quietly after a moment. "I'll distract the watchman, you think of a plan to get us out of here,"

Damian's father raised an eyebrow, but Damian paid his old man no mind. He knew that he would be of no use to his father right then. There was no way he could think straight, not with Bella's life practically in his hands. Thinking back on how long it took him to get from Bella's castle back to the village, Damian could say that Genevieve and her followers were already at her front doors, pitchforks and shovels at the ready.

"You'd better get started, Son," his father said, "We've only got so much time,"

Damian nodded and scooted closer to the guard. The burly man looked up at Damian suspiciously, but Damian just made himself comfortable, ignoring the spear the man was carrying.

"Hello," Damian started.

"Evenin'" the man nodded, but offered nothing else.

"My name's Damian," Damian tried again, and the man complied,

"My name's LeFou. It's nice to meet you Damian," then the man cringed. "I mean, it _would _be nice to meet you, if you weren't…"

"Accused of being crazy?" Damian said dryly. LeFou coughed, but Damian couldn't let the conversation dwindle. His father always murmured to himself when he was thinking. If LeFou listened too closely, he would understand that they were planning on escaping. And if that happened, there was no way Bella would survive her birthday.

"How did you become an asylum watchman?" Damian asked, genuinely intrigued. No one really wanted to grow up to be an asylum guard. The man in front of him seemed respectable enough, and a little on the soft side. Damian was his father's son, and all those questions swirling around in his head needed to be answered.

"Oh," LeFou smiled fondly. "My wife," At Damian's confused raise of the eyebrow, LeFou elaborated. "My wife's younger brother was accused of going insane about two years ago. There was no way for her to see him unless she had connections with the asylum's higher ups. I used to be a blacksmith's apprentice. I was going to take over for Marcel when he retired, but here I am now, in front of you,"

"And you're okay with that?" Damian asked incredulously. How could he be comfortable with being an asylum's watchman? It didn't make any sense.

"Of course!" LeFou sounded surprised, as if everyone wanted to be an asylum's guard.

"But… why?" Damian was really getting interested in the conversation now. LeFou obviously had a secret to being happy, even with his uncomfortable lifestyle. If LeFou revealed it to Damian, then he could tell Bella when he saved her. Then she wouldn't be so sad all the time.

"I would do anything to make my wife happy. I love her," LeFou said simply. Then, LeFou turned to Damian. The man narrowed his eyes, and then grinned, "So, who's the lucky girl?"

Damian blinked.

"What?"

LeFou scoffed and rolled his eyes,

"Don't give me any of that. I know the look of a man in love. I look in the mirror every day. So, who's the girl?"

_Who do I… love?_ Damian thought. _Do I even love anyone? _

"Let's make this easy," LeFou decided. "You wake up, looking forward to spending the day with the love of your life. You simply lay in bed for a while, thinking of the way she talks, the way she laughs, and way just being around her makes you feel happy. She walks in and brings you breakfast in bed-"

"Bella knows I don't like to eat while lying down," Damian interjected, and LeFou chuckled. "What?" Damian asked.

"I never said her name. Boy, it seems to me that your heart knows you love this 'Bella,' even if your head hasn't caught up yet,"

"I'm in love with… Bella?" Damian asked, not quite able to wrap his mind around it. Damian wanted to just sit in silence for a while, contemplating his feelings, wondering if what LeFou had revealed was what he actually felt or not. Unfortunately, he could still hear his father muttering behind him.

"So, how much do you earn, exactly?" Damian asked, wanting to continue in conversation with the man, but desperately seeking to change the subject.

"Still in denial, eh, boy?" LeFou chuckled. "That's alright. Well, I get paid by the person. If I successfully watch over one crazy, I get two coins for the job. For the both of you, I'll get four,"

"Four? For an entire night of standing there, guarding us?" Damian asked, not quite believing what he was hearing. What were they doing to this poor man? He was obviously dedicated, and a hard worker. He deserved so much better. He should have gotten a promotion by now, at least.

That got Damian thinking. Two coins a person was not much. In fact, it was barely enough to live by. If Damian offered LeFou the right price… he would let Damian go, right? One man in love to another?

"Yes, boy. Four entire coins," LeFou grinned proudly. Damian felt bad for him. He would hand the man the money, not only to save Bella, but to help LeFou and his wife, as well. He thought of how much supplies Bella had given him. She packed him food, and without even thinking about it, had dropped a couple of handfuls of coins in the pack as well.

"Excuse me for a minute, LeFou," Damian requested. "Dad!" Damian whispered, grabbing onto his father's shoulder. "I have a plan!"

"You do?" his father asked, rubbing his face with his hand. "Let's hear it, Son,"

"Our guard's name is LeFou. He only gets two coin per head," Damian explained quickly. "But! If we were to give him a little extra…" Damian trailed off as his old man started nodding, warming up to the idea.

"How much money do you have?" his old man asked.

"I was just about to check," Damian said, crawling to the pack. He quietly poured the precious medallions onto the floor and counted them. He couldn't believe Bella! Damian counted again, just to make sure, but he got the same number as before. "Dad," Damian called. "Could you count these for me?"

"Getting old, are we, Son?" his father coughed. Damian pursed his lips, but said,

"No, I think I'm counting wrong."

His father counted. Then counted again. It was the same number as before. Damian shuffled to LeFou, feeling a little guilty about spending all the money he was about to. But Bella had given him the money to spend on what he needed. And right now, he needed her safe. And that was priceless.

"LeFou, if you watched, say… thirty people, how many coins would you get?"

The man thought for a while, and Damian bounced impatiently on the balls of his feet. Bella was running out of time!

"I'd have to say about sixty coins?" LeFou asked.

"Well, what if I pay you sixty coins- _right now_\- if you let me go? And sixty coins if you let my old man go? That's one hundred and twenty coins total, LeFou," Damian said quickly.

"O-one _hundred_ and twenty_?_" LeFou said, as if he couldn't imagine his ears. Damian hadn't believed it either. Neither had his father. But it was true! Bella had given him one hundred and twenty coins without even thinking about it.

LeFou closed his mouth, and his face scrunched together, as if he was eating something foul. "As much as I…_ appreciate_ what you're trying to do, there's a number of things wrong with your plan. How am I supposed to believe you even have one hundred and twenty coins? Also, I can't just put my job on the line for a couple of- no offence intended- crazies? Sorry, boy, but that's a no-can-do on my part,"

Damian felt like crying. And strangling the man on the other side of the bars. But mostly crying. He ran a hand through his already disheveled hair and said desperately,

"Here, I can prove I have a hundred and twenty," he grabbed his satchel and opened the top, showing LeFou all the money inside of it. "I've already counted it. Twice. Please, LeFou!" Damian was pleading. "If I don't get out _now_ then they'll kill her! They'll kill Bella!"

When Damian showed LeFou the money, the older man still looked unconvinced, but at the mention of Bella, he visibly softened. He pulled out his keys and opened the door on the left. He mumbled,

"You'd better get out fast. There's a horse still behind the stables. Marcel didn't want anyone to use his prize stallion for a potentially dangerous mission, so he hid it. It's the fastest horse you'll ever see. Get on him and ride like there's no tomorrow," LeFou grabbed Damian's arm while he was walking by. "Save that girl of yours," Damian could see the honesty and sincerity in LeFou's eyes.

"I will," Damian said, already determined.

As soon as he was out of the wooden cell, Damian started running, ignoring the pain in his head, and the cramps in this back, and legs. He had one thought: _Bella_. He had to save her.

Damian ran around the back of the barn, and sure enough, there was Marcel's horse. Not even bothering to tack it up, Damian swung himself onto the midnight colored animal's broad back and coaxed it towards the forest, straight to Bella's castle. He had already thought the path through, multiple times while he was in the wooden cage.

Damian started the horse off at a jog, and then pushed it to a canter, but soon that wasn't enough. Damian kept clicking his tongue, and digging his heels into the horse's sides, but it wouldn't cooperate. In one last attempt, Damian kicked it with his heel, and the horse took off like a bullet. No matter how much Damian wanted to slow down, he knew he couldn't. Genevieve was already at the castle, he was certain. It took about a day's journey from the village to the castle, and it had already been almost two since she left.

Damian urged the horse to go faster, and it started panting. Damian didn't even have the energy to feel bad for the animal. All his thoughts and worries and actions were for Bella. He would get there in time. He would warn her. He would save her. He had to.

* * *

Genevieve had to admit that, for a monster, the Mistress of the castle had good taste. The furnishings of the castle were a little outdated, but the colors were classic, and still looked nice. While the tones were dark, the feel of the castle was comfortable and safe. The men in the second group of men from the village looked around the castle in silent awe.

Genevieve looked away from the decor and called out,

"Leave it alone! This stuff is probably cursed! Why else would everyone else be gone?"

Immediately, the men retracted their hands from reaching out to touch anything, and moved closer to Genevieve. She shivered from the sudden warmth. Even though she wouldn't want to admit it, she was afraid. Terribly so.

She and the rest of the town's upper class had sent the farmers and poorer shop keepers into the castle first so that they could soften the beast's defenses. Never had it occurred to Genevieve or the men surrounding her that the men would have gotten defeated. Genevieve forced herself to stop thinking of them as she pushed her tears back.

_Benjamin._

The first name slipped through her mind without her noticing.

_François._

The second name was more noticeable. Damian always went to François's store on the eve of the anniversary of his sister's death.

_Germaine. Antoine. Philippe. Leon. Jacque. Bernard. Edouard. Eugene. Gaston. _

It took everything in Genevieve to not collapse right there, and cry her eyes out. Those had been her fellow villagers. Her friends. Her _family. _And she had sent them to their deaths.

"There!" Julian called out. All the men turned in the direction he was pointing in and tensed. Genevieve was glad for the break. More than anything, she needed something to distract her from the grief of losing half of her people.

"What did you see?" Gilbert asked Julian.

"I'm not too sure myself," Julian answered. "But there's only one thing living here, isn't there?"

All the men nodded uneasily. One of them ignored Genevieve's earlier warning about the objects in the castle being cursed as he grabbed a lone candelabrum on a bookshelf. It was a little thing. There were only three stands, and the center-most wax candle had a frown carved onto it. Not just a normal frown, but more like an angry scowl. There was something odd about the candelabrum.

Genevieve squinted at it and asked Gregoire to hand it to her. In her hands, the candelabrum was even stranger. It was warm, but not only because of the flames. It was almost like the metal was making its own heat. She paused for a second. She dropped it suddenly, and a loud squeak left her mouth. The candelabrum had a heartbeat!

Before any of the men could ask about what she had seen, the little candelabrum hopped straight up and yelled out,

"Now!"

And that's when- if possible- things got even stranger.


	15. Unpredictable Happenings

**Chapter 15**

**Genevieve/Damian**

"Leon?" Genevieve cried, not quite comprehending what she was seeing. Maybe the castle was haunted by the souls of those the beast devoured? Was Leon there to warn them of her? Or was he going to take revenge and kill them himself? Genevieve felt a cold sweat break out on her forehead, and the hairs on the back of her neck prickled. She took a deep breath and convinced herself that there was _not_ a ghost standing in front of her.

"Genevieve," Leon- or his ghost- didn't sound surprised at all. He sounded angry. He didn't even give the gorgeous woman in front of him time to respond. "Get out," he spat.

Genevieve and the rest of the men with her were still trying to wrap their minds around it. Leon was in front of them. But… Leon was dead. Was he warning them? Was the creature truly too much for them to handle?

"Leon, did the beast do this to you?" Gilbert asked hesitantly. Leon's nose flared and he tensed. To Genevieve, it looked like the spirit was about to attack Gilbert, but then François's ghost stepped out of the shadows and moved in front of Leon.

"Leon! We can't just fight our way through this! If we just explain-"

"Explaining will do nothing! Look at them! We must drive them out!"

"Yeah! Listen to Leon, François!" Benjamin's specter called from the left.

"No, don't you understand that bloodshed just leads to more bloodshed? We must do this peacefully, boy!"

"Gaston, are you serious?"

Genevieve couldn't wrap her head around it. Ghouls of her former friends were appearing from every corner of the room, and were all arguing about something. To save them? To fight them? Genevieve wasn't too sure anymore. And, she was definitely too terrified to figure it out.

"G-Genevieve was right!" Julian cried out, horrified. "This castle- it's haunted!"

The men in Genevieve's mob panicked and tried to flee, but Genevieve was petrified. There were specific things which scared her stiff. Just the thought of them made her shiver, and on Hallow's eve, when all the children dressed up as them, Genevieve stayed inside with her windows and shutters closed. She would hide in her closet with her most prized possession- a blanket Damian had given her one cold night when she was still a barmaid- and would wait impatiently until daylight. Those specific things were ghosts. And right then, she was surrounded by them.

"They're everywhere!" Jean-Michal yelled, and all the men crowded into a circle, Genevieve in the center. Her heart was pounding, and she was sweating. She didn't even have it in her to wonder if Damian would find her unattractive if he saw her right then. She was too busy keeping herself from sobbing in fear.

"We're not dead, you idiots!" Leon said, slapping Julian on top of the head. Julian's face blanched, but Genevieve let out a sigh of relief. Her trembling lessened and her eyes dried slightly.

"Then… why are you still here?" Horace asked. "Is the beast… did you kill it?"

Everyone looked at Leon expectantly, but his face hardened, and his fists clenched at his sides.

"That's what we wanted to _talk_ to you about," François said, gazing pointedly at Leon.

"She's not what we thought," Benjamin stated.

"Mr. Labarre and Damian were right!" Antoine testified.

"You all just need to set down your weapons, go back home, forget this ever happened, and let the Labarres go," Leon said firmly.

Genevieve's face flamed. If they were right, and the monster really was so… likeable, then wouldn't Damian just go running back to it if they let him go without killing the beast? No. Genevieve loved Damian, and he was going to be hers. There was no way the 'Mistress' of the castle was even capable of an emotion that strong, that good. Genevieve was not going to let Damian just throw his life away! Not when he could have such a wonderful one with her!

"They've been bribed!" Genevieve called out. "They're with the beast! It offered them money in exchange for her life! They're traitors!"

"Traitors?" the word rumbled uneasily around the room. Those people used to be their neighbors. Their friends.

"If we let that thing live, how can we guarantee that it won't come after us some day when it's hungry?"

"No!" Leon yelled, trying to get closer to Genevieve. But, Genevieve was surrounded by a company of strong men who were like putty in her hands.

"Traitors!" Genevieve projected.

"Traitors!" the men echoed. Genevieve chanced a glance to the first group of men, and immediately wished she hadn't. Her heart twinged at the look on Gaston's face. He had been her employer for years, and here she was, about to…

"They need to be executed!"

The men in her group let out a chorus of low, menacing cheers, and moved to hold the farmers and small shop owners down. A loud howl-like screech echoed through the castle, and the men and Genevieve froze. Everyone turned to the staircase, from where they were sure something was coming.

"Do you think she's mad?" Genevieve heard Jacque mumble.

"We tied her to a bed against her will. What do you think?" Leon retorted.

* * *

Damian leapt off of Philippe and ran to the damaged and splintered front doors of Bella's castle. He barely stopped to examine the destroyed entrance, which used to be so grand. He had only one thought: Bella. He had to save her. One second could be the difference between life and death for her. A couple of useless doors would not stop Damian.

He rushed into the castle which had become so familiar to him in the past few months, and froze. There was a loud roar, and Damian was sure it was Bella. He turned to look up the stairs with the rest of the crowd that had congregated in her entrance.

Damian heard a couple of heavy thuds before Bella appeared on top of the stairs. Even with her fur sticking up everywhere, dust coating her scales, and a long swath of cloth tied to her ankle for some reason, she looked beautiful. Damian's heart skipped a beat, and he let out a breath he didn't know he had been holding. She was beautiful… and alive. And _angry. _

She started storming down the stairs, and Damian couldn't help but wonder what was going on. Damian had never seen her that livid, not even when he had entered her east wing, a lifetime ago. What had happened? What had he missed? But, even more important than all of that: what was _going_ to happen?

**Hard. This chapter was the hardest one to write yet. I seriously hope I haven't just ruined the story with this crappy chapter. I tried, and that's all I can really ask of myself, right? Anyways, for this chapter especially, reviews would be amazing. Thanks for favoriting, following, and (of course) reviewing. Next chapter should be up soon :)**


	16. Knowing Damian Labarre

**Chapter 16**

**Damian/Bella**

Damian shrunk back from the furious fire in Bella's usually cool gray eyes until he realized that she wasn't even looking at him, only at Genevieve. With a sad weight pushing down on his chest, Damian realized that Bella hadn't even noticed him yet.

A low growl emanated from Bella as she stepped off the stairs, and waves of cold rage flowed to the townspeople in her entrance. Damian knew then that Bella wasn't simply afraid. She was angry. Dangerously so. Why? What had he missed? Damian shook the frustrating questions from his head; they didn't matter right then, Bella did. Only Bella.

"Bella, please, we meant no harm-" Benjamin started to move forward, but Bella cut him off with an icy warning.

"Get out. You, you friends, and my staff. All of you _get out!_"

Damian was taken back to the night he trespassed Bella's east wing. Then, too, she had snapped her words out, coating them with a thin layer of ice until the façade cracked, and she yelled out the last couple of words.

Everyone jumped at the two words she yelled, and without a second thought, about half of the men in front of Damian grabbed a handful of furniture each and fled. Damian was stuck to the ground. He went to Bella's castle to save her, and even with half of the men gone, she was still in danger. He couldn't fail his mission. Bella was too important to him for him to lose her. Even when she was angry enough with her cold fury to burn, he… loved her. At least, Le Fou thought he did.

Bella growled loudly before she turned to the rest of the men from the village. She still didn't notice Damian, and the weight on his chest grew heavier. Bella bared her teeth and tensed before crouching on all four legs of hers, tail poised for the offensive. The men minus Damian clenched their weapons with white knuckles, and they had looks of pure determination on their faces. But, a laugh broke the thick tension in the air. Damian blinked in surprise. Genevieve?

"So you're _her?_"

As much as Damian hated to admit it, he knew Genevieve. He knew the wide-eyed look in her eyes, and the way her nose was scrunching slightly in the middle, and the way her voice sounded stronger than it normally ever would. She was trying to be selfless. She was trying to stop the fighting. She was _trying_ to save the rest of the men. Too bad she was only making things much, much worse than it already was.

"You're the 'girl' they're crazy about?" Genevieve scoffed and flicked some of her silky strands over her shoulder. "I'm much more beautiful than you," Damian mentally rolled his eyes. _As if. I've been seeing you for a long time, Genevieve. Bella's the most beautiful thing I've _ever_ seen. _

Bella's form crumbled slightly, and Damian could see the hurt in her eyes. Damian grew angry. He knew that her beauty was a sore-spot for Bella. He was about to make himself known, but Genevieve crossed the line before he had a chance to. She stepped forward, and Damian almost didn't see the knife in her hands. He started shoving his way through the men, but they were entranced in their leader's words. He tried calling out to Bella, to warn her, but the men around him started rumbling and shuffling, and generally making too much noise for him to be heard over.

"I bet Damian only stayed here out of fear of you!"

"No!" Bella's voice trembled violently. "We're friends!" She sounded unsure of herself, and Damian's heart twinged at the title she gave their relationship.

"Haha!" Genevieve mocked as she stepped ever closer. Damian grunted against the men in front of them. Their mothers must have been brick walls! "Bella, was it? Let me tell you a little secret. You and Damian were barely acquaintances, let alone friends. He ran back to the village and practically _begged _us to come here and kill you,"

Damian stopped struggling as he felt the breath leave his body. Bella always was sensitive. What if she believed Genevieve? What if… she started to hate him? Damian had lived in the village for years, not caring if the townspeople talked behind his back, or disliked him. But, he wasn't sure that he could handle the same treatment from Bella. He felt an uncomfortable heat in his chest from just the idea of Bella believing the she-devil in front of her.

_Please, Bella,_ Damian found himself praying. _Don't believe her._

* * *

Bella's muscles completely failed her for a second, and she almost collapsed onto the surprisingly well-polished floor. Damian… Damian thought that she was a monster? All of the smiles he gave her, the kind words he told her, the laughs he shared with her… they couldn't all have been a lie, could they? Bella growled. The pain in her chest was the exact reason why she always guarded herself. How could she have been so stupid as to have let Damian inside her walls? And when exactly had that happened?

The beautiful blonde woman stepped closer to Bella, and Bella looked at her warily. This woman reminded her of someone. That smug smile, the way she walked as if she were doing the earth a favor, those sharp, calculating eyes… the woman was exactly like her mother. And if there was one thing that her mother was good at, it was spinning tales to get her way. Bella narrowed her eyes.

"No." Bella said firmly, glaring straight into the woman's stunning blue eyes. Bella hated her for having the most striking appearance she had ever seen, but such a manipulative personality. Bella hated the way the woman looked at her as if she was a mindless beast. Bella hated the condescending way she spoke to her.

"Yes," the woman didn't miss a beat, and only stepped closer. Bella growled louder, and the woman paused for a second, a flash of fear illuminating her perfect face before a calm look overtook her. Bella hated how she looked as fake as her mother had always been.

"Then where is he?" Bella pushed her shoulders back, and stood to her full height, happy for the high ceilings. She looked more menacing this way, she hoped.

"What?" The blonde asked, sounding annoyed.

Bella moved closer, towering over the woman, and felt her anger pile up inside of her. All the heated emotions inside of her translated into her icy voice. "Damian Labarre. Where _is _he?" Bella couldn't help but to scream out the second to last word. She was just so angry, and so overwhelmed by everyone in her house. She just wanted Damian, and a nice book which he could read to her. But... Damian _wasn't_ there. Why not?

The woman blinked, and Bella smirked. She was, for once, glad for her fangs. There had never been a single person she had wanted to scare before. But, she had never met Genevieve before. Bella could feel the sharp teeth grazing her lip, and she had to force herself to keep from wincing. Instead, she growled, and continued.

"I might not have been his _best_ friend, but I know Damian Labarre. If he had a problem with me, he would have confronted me about it personally. He already has. Many times. Why would now be any different?"

Bella moved closer to the woman, and turned her back to the men. It wouldn't seem too smart, but the woman was obviously the one calling the shots. If Bella could separate her and break her down, the other men should leave with minimal resistance. Bella wouldn't have to fight anyone, and she would have the satisfaction of peacefully destroying the woman. At least, that was what Bella hoped would happen. The men shifted uncomfortably, Bella could hear that much. But, she was focusing entirely on making the woman on the stairs squirm in her boots. Bella kept her eyes locked on the woman's, and kept speaking, with icy venom dripping off of every word.

"He's stubborn. Almost irritatingly so. He would have come whether you let him or not. If he had a problem with me, which I'm starting to doubt he did, he wouldn't let any of you come here. If he thought that I was dangerous enough to kill, he wouldn't have gotten all of you involved. He would have first helped his father heal, and then he would have come alone.

"Don't you know anything about him? Damian Labarre is kind and protective and wonderful, and he doesn't want to kill me,"

The woman's eyes kept widening until it seemed to Bella that the entire sky was staring her in the face. There was a tension-filled moment of silence, until the woman turned to the men, red faced, and screamed,

"What are you doing just standing there? Kill it!"

Most of the men turned and ran at the mere thought of having to fight Bella, which was a bittersweet feeling for Bella. It hurt her that those men were so afraid of her. Every time anyone ran from her, it stung. But, she never wanted to hurt anyone. Even at that point, she doubted she would lay a single hand on the woman. Their running saved her from immense moral turmoil.

Of the almost twenty men who came with the woman, only about six were left. And one of those five was standing, weaponless, in a dark corner. The five other men started running towards her, but only four made it to their destination. The man in the corner intercepted the fifth on his way to her.

Bella didn't have time to understand why. She dropped to all fours and poised her tail so that she could push all four of them back at once. Two of them gave up and ran after their impact on the hard marble ground. The other two, however, seemed to be almost unusually loyal to the woman. They stood back up after a second of rest and rushed back at her.

The man who had stood in the corner pulled one of the two men aside,punched him in the face, and then shoved him to the door. The man's partner, after weighing the odds of winning against Bella in a one on one battle, turned and ran as well.

As much as she would have liked to turn to the man who had ended up being her savior, Bella knew that her battle wasn't quite over yet. She whirled around, ready to face the woman, only to glare at empty air.

"Bella!" her blood ran cold. Hadn't she told all of her servants to leave? "Bella, help me!"

Chip was calling from the top of the stairs. Not even bothering to see what was up there endangering the little teacup, Bella ran in the direction of his innocent little voice: up the stairs. Chip was being held over the railing of the aisle leading to the staircase.

"Let him go," Bella growled to the woman, stepping closer.

"Ah, ah, ah!" the woman sang, dangling Chip over the thirty foot drop with her little finger. "I don't know too much about tea cup anatomy, but I'm guessing that if I happen to drop him here, it won't be good?"

"No," Bella whined. Her ears pressed against her head in submission. "Please, just let him go,"

Before the woman had a chance to list her demands, a powerful, handsome voice called from the ground,

"Genevieve! Let him go!"

"Damian?" _Genevieve_ gasped. Bella didn't give herself time to be surprised. She snatched Chip from the woman's clutches and set him on the ground, ordering him to run, to get out.

Bella straightened, and was about to face Genevieve, but felt something on her pelt. Bella's knees buckled with an unexpected weight, and she grunted as the weight shifted to the side. She slammed into the side-railing, and she heard something snap.

Bella's fur was being pulled, her eyes were being scratched, and she could have sworn that something bit her ear. The only possible person that could be causing her so much pain would be Genevieve. Even so, Bella couldn't find it in herself to injure the woman. Instead, Bella let out her pain through a wobbly roar.

"Bella!" she heard Damian yell. She thought that he was going up the stairs, but he would have been wasting his time. She was going down.

She didn't want to, but Genevieve's weight kept shifting to the right, towards the stairwell. Bella bumped into the fence-like structure again, and there was a louder _snap_ followed by a hollow _thud. _And then Bella felt the weightlessness of falling

**This chapter was a little easier than the last one. Not really much to say other than... four more chapters? It's almost done! I'm happy, this was getting exhausting! Anyway, reviews are appreciated, but follows and favorites are awesome, too. :)**


	17. Loving and Dying

**Chapter 17**

**Bella/Damian/Genevieve/The Enchantress**

Bella felt like she was in water on her way to the ground. Everything moved impossibly slow, but entirely too fast at the same time. She thought about the woman on her back. If Bella didn't move, Genevieve would die. But, wouldn't the world be better off without a woman like her?

Bella decided that she didn't have the right to decide that. The enchantress had doomed Bella and her staff to a fate they didn't deserve. There was no way Bella could do that. No matter how much she hated Genevieve, Bella wouldn't let her die without even trying to save her.

Genevieve screamed, and Bella struggled to turn her body around. With her shielding Genevieve, Bella felt lighter than before, as if the possible guilt was lifted from her shoulders. Bella blinked. When she opened her eyes, they were at the perfect angle to see the ground right before her body collided with it.

* * *

Damian felt his heart stop as he saw Bella go over the railing.

"No!" he screamed, and he leaned on the banister, reaching out like he could catch her. But he was too far away. Damian watched in horror as Bella maneuvered herself to be underneath Genevieve just before the two women hit the marble floor. There was a loud thud before the deafening silence, and neither Bella nor Genieveve moved an inch.

Damian's muscles moved before he knew exactly what he was doing. He found himself doing that a lot when he was around Bella: acting before thinking. He hoped and prayed that she lived long enough for him to continue being that reckless.

In less than a minute, Damian was kneeling next to Bella. He held his hands over her face, not quite touching her fur. He was afraid. He had never been so terrified. Not when he had seen Lilith, bloody and ripped apart from the wolf attack, not when his father hadn't come back home after a week, not when he had first met the Mistress of the castle. Damian's heart was pounding, and his eyes were watering, and his muscles were trembling.

Bella wasn't breathing.

* * *

Genevieve groaned. Her head and left leg hurt like never before, but she knew she should get up. She opened her eyes and her chest sent tingles of happiness to the rest of her body. Damian was down on his knees next to her. His eyes were red, and his hands were shaking so badly that Genevieve almost thought he was shivering before she figured out that he was trembling.

He looked so heartbroken, Genevieve wanted to comfort him, to let him know that she was still alive. She held up her hands and smiled warmly at the handsome man, expecting him to smile back. Instead, he ignored her. Genevieve pulled her arms back to herself and wondered why he was so distressed if he wasn't worried about her.

Damian moved his hand cautiously towards the beast's neck and felt around, probably for a pulse. He didn't need to bother. Genevieve was wrapped in its warm arms. They wouldn't be warm for long. The beast had no pulse. Even Genevieve knew what no pulse meant.

Damian kept feeling around the creature's body, trying desperately to find a sign of life. He eventually figured out that there were none. He made a choking noise, and small cracks appeared on Genevieve's heart. Damian was silent, but his eyes were as red as a rose. One tear fell down his perfect cheek, and then another, and another. Genevieve saw the pure devastation in his wet eyes and almost started crying with him.

She truly did love Damian. She never wanted to see him like this. Never again. Genevieve slowly got out of the beast's arms and stepped away until her back hit a wall. She still had a chance to comfort Damian. He would realize that he was crying over an unholy monstrosity, and see that she was fine, and then they would run away together and get married. She had a chance. She did. She just needed to wait for the right moment.

Genevieve saw him touch the beast's fur, almost reverently, and she couldn't stop the jealousy from blooming in her chest. He had never, not once, touched her like he touched the vile thing in front of him.

He kept touching its fur, probably looking for an injury. A small curl of hair fell onto his forehead, which was creased slightly. His mouth was downturned, and his brows were furrowed. Damian was frustrated, and Genevieve could accurately guess that he hadn't found any injuries. Even with the lack of physical damage, Genevieve and Damian both knew one thing: the creature wasn't breathing. The monster was dead.

"No… no! Not now! You can't die!" Damian's voice cracked with emotion, and Genevieve's heart splintered a little more. Damian leaned forward, whispering into the monster's surprisingly silky, rose-scented fur just loud enough for Genevieve to hear. Her heart completely shattered at his declaration.

"I love you."

* * *

The enchantress flashed into Bella's room and sniffed at the grime, and the scent of sweaty commoner men. She watched as the last petal on the rose she had gifted to the spoiled girl just over two decades ago trembled violently. The girl's time would be up in a few moments.

The enchantress floated to the ground and smiled sadly at the torn picture of the girl's youth. If the Mistress of the land was human still, she could easily have been the most beautiful woman in the world. Too bad the girl had been so stingy when the enchantress had been in a particularly awful mood. The rain always made the enchantress cruel.

But, by the time the enchantress had realized that she had cursed a girl for being cautious, it had been too late. Magic can't be reversed, only amended.

The enchantress picked her way across the room to the balcony. She sighed sadly at the sight in front of her. The entire world was in front of the girl, but she had to be hidden from it all. The enchantress couldn't even imagine what had happened inside the poor girl's head in all her years trapped inside the stone prison.

The powerful woman stepped lightly in front of the glass case again, and gingerly placed her fingertips on it, wishing that she could help the girl more. But then, she heard something which brought a gentle curve to her lips.

"_I love you." _

And the last petal fell.


	18. Despair and Transformation

**Chapter 18**

**Genevieve/Damian**

Genevieve was so heartbroken and overwhelmed with despair that she almost didn't notice the white flash enveloping the entire room. But when she did, Genevieve barely concealed her gasp.

In front of the beast and Damian, the bright light was receding, and revealed a tall woman. She was probably ten feet tall, with hair blonder than Genevieve's, and a pure white gown. The woman was so beautiful that, in her presence, Genevieve felt like the girl she used to be. The mousy-haired, quiet girl who worked as a barmaid for free, because it was the only place she was even slightly wanted.

Looking at the woman's beautiful face and pristine aura, Genevieve couldn't help but think that everything which she used to think was hers was gone. There was nothing to her name anymore. Damian was apparently in love with someone- more like some_thing- _else, the village men had abandoned her, and now she wasn't even as beautiful as she thought she was anymore.

The strange woman looked at Damian and the monster he was _still_ crying over, and smiled at them. Maybe it was because of how stressed Genevieve had been the past couple of months. Maybe it was because she was still in shock because of Damian's declaration to the mistress of the castle. Maybe it was because her mind had been trying to convince her eyes that what they were seeing was wrong. But, for whatever reason, it wasn't until that moment that Genevieve realized a few essential things.

One. The woman was glowing. She wasn't just healthy and happy, but there was a real source of light coming from the ethereal woman. One which could allow Genevieve to walk from her home to the pub in the middle of the night without even having to worry about stepping on a rock wrong. Two. The woman was floating. Not stepping lightly, she was actually floating above the ground, her feet not touching the floor. With her perfect features and cloud-like ability, it was almost like the woman was a stained glass window picture brought to life. With those two observations, the obvious conclusion would be: Three. The woman was an enchantess.

Genevieve started to edge her way out of the crazy castle. There was no way that Genevieve would do _anything_ in the presence of that enchantress. Everyone knew that they were horribly temperamental, and incredibly dangerous. And Genevieve was not stupid enough to upset one. She was still twenty feet from the splintered front entrance doors, but Genevieve was willing to take a chance.

She bolted out of the castle, into the cool night. She saw Philippe, Damian's horse, waiting patiently by the tree he was tied to. Genevieve's heart throbbed painfully at the thought of Damian's name, his face, his very being. She took Philippe's reins and pulled herself onto him, and then she rode towards the town. If she couldn't have Damian, then no one could. And no one could ensure that reality more than an enchantress.

* * *

Damian noticed the enchantress only because she moved towards Bella. Damian saw something in his peripheral vision coming closer, so he raised his head. It was the enchantress's arm. Damian tensed and held Bella closer to himself than he would have thought to be comfortable. The enchantress waved her hand over Bella's body, and that was the last normal thing which happened for probably the majority of the night.

Bella was cocooned in light, and her body lifted from the ground. Her fur started to disappear, almost like it was evaporating. The light around her grew brighter, and soon it was impossible for Damian to see anything more.

As much as he wanted to keep an eye on Bella, to make sure that the enchantress wasn't hurting her, Damian couldn't. Bella was going through her metamorphosis, but Damian was in the middle of a different type of transformation.

Seconds after Bella was lifted into the air by the light surrounding her, the enchantress had lifted her arms and shot out another wave of light. Nothing too drastic happened to the aesthetic of the castle, but there was a palpable difference. The air was lighter, not as heavy. There was no dust or grime permanently set on everything, and the furniture and decorations gleamed. Damian absentmindedly wondered if Mrs. Potts's china was gleaming, and Lumiere's stand shone as bright as the flames on his wicks.

Damian looked around the castle. It was almost exactly like before. The colors were dark, or neutral, and the air was warm. But for some reason, it seemed more comfortable. More… welcoming. It was homier.

Of course Damian thought it would have been even more hospitable if Bella was alive, and standing there with him. He looked up at the shell of light that still held her prisoner.

Damian wasn't sure exactly when, but it felt like an eternity later that the light started dimming, and lowered down to the ground. Damian stood impatiently on the ground, wondering what the enchantress still floating above him could have possibly done to Bella, who was already the most beautiful thing Damian could imagine.

The light completely faded away, and a figure lay on the ground in front of Damian. He dropped to his knees next to the body, expecting the familiar gray fur and purple cloak of Belladonna Casteoux. Instead, he found himself face to face with a girl. Actually, she was a woman.

The new person had dark brown curls framing her pale face, with long lashes, and full lips. Her limbs were long and slender, and her waist was tiny. She was dressed in a dark green gown, painfully like the one Bella wore for her birthday ball. The only difference was the shade of green of the gowns.

The woman was beautiful, there was no question about that, but Damian felt a stinging disappointment deep in his stomach. Where was Bella? The least he could do for her was… bury her.

Damian turned to the glowing woman above him and glared.

"Where is she?" He demanded, his voice was thick and raw from his suppressed sobs. "Where is Bella?"

The dangerously beautiful woman blinked slowly before smiling mysteriously. She smiled at the woman laying on the ground in front of Damian before vanishing like smoke. Damian was left alone with the body of perhaps the most beautiful woman in all of France, wondering who she was. Wondering where Bella was. Wondering if it mattered. Wondering if she would have forgiven him. Wondering if she had ever loved him back.

**Haha! I totally forgot I even had this chapter, I thought I posted it. Whoops! **


	19. Loving and Living

**Alright, so there actually is a new chapter, it's just not this one. When I originally planned this story out, it had twenty chapters, and now I'm about to finish, but there was only nineteen, so I was wondering what was up. So, I did a little digging and found a missing chapter that I COMPLETELY forgot to upload. Sorry about that. It's the original chapter 12. So, check it out, it has some Genevieve/Gerard stuff, with a little more of people figuring out Damian's emotions for him. Last chapter for this story should be out before next Tuesday! Love y'all :)**

* * *

**Chapter 19**

**The Staff/Damian**

The staff, or as they preferred to be addressed, Bella's family, couldn't believe what had happened. They had been outside with the nice townsfolk who had tried to protect Bella, when a light flashed inside the castle. They couldn't see anything else through the broken doors, because with the flash inside came a series of flashes outside. Within seconds, all of them had been covered with a bright light. The villagers had cried out in shock and had started to run away. But Bella's family couldn't focus on that, because that was when the pain had started.

It was terrible. The feeling was like their entire being was being ripped apart, inch by inch, and sewed back together, incorrectly.

Lumiere was certain that he had heard Mrs. Potts and his sweetheart, Babette, cry out in pain, but Cogsworth firmly stated that it was Lumiere, in fact, who had made the shrill screech. Mrs. Potts, who had indeed made the terrible, pain-filled sound, decided that enough was enough with those two, and decided to knock some sense into the fully grown men.

"Shame on you!" she shouted. The men immediately quieted down and lowered their gazes. Mrs. Potts never yelled at anyone. And now she was yelling at them. It was quite an out-of-body experience. Very humbling. "Here you are, _human_ again, and all you can do is argue?" Mrs. Potts shook her head in disappointment and said harshly, "_Shame_ on you! Where do you think Bella, that darling girl, is right now? Probably alone, and probably confused. But go ahead, argue about silly trifles. _Like you always do. _It's not like a miracle just happened, and your lives have changed forever,"

"Madame, we are sorry," Lumiere tried.

"Yes, Ma'am, we do apolo-" Cogsworth was cut off.

"No! I am not going to listen to you two bumbleheads any more today. Chip? Where are you? We're going inside to see Bella! Chip? Chip!"

All the staff took a moment to look around. But there was no little boy to be found anywhere. Frantic, Mrs. Potts cried out louder than before,

"CHIP?!"

A faint cry was heard from within the castle, and while the words weren't nearly intelligible, Mrs. Potts didn't hesitate before racing inside, followed closely by the rest of her friends.

Once inside, Mrs. Potts called again,

"Chip?"

A sniffle and a small sob came from the left, and as Mrs. Potts turned in that direction, she barely stifled a gasp. Cogsworth, who couldn't see anything over Lumiere's tall frame, huffed and asked,

"What? What is it?" Everyone around him was still and silent. Even Lumiere did nothing to exasperate the plump man. "What's happening?" When again no one bothered to answer him, Cogsworth shouldered his way through the crowd, and when he saw what everyone else had already seen, his face became ashen.

Almost directly underneath the same stair rail the Mistress used to play on when she was but a small child, her older form lay. Her face was white, her form unnaturally relaxed, with her limbs set in strange angles. She wasn't moving. Damian was draped her, silent sobs wracking the young man's body. Chip stood in the corner, frozen, and not sure what to do, but when he saw his mother, he started to walk, trembling, to her side.

Cosworth glanced to his left and saw that Mrs. Potts was crying, trails of tears streaming down her aged cheeks. Cogsworth felt something on his own cheek, and his immediate reaction was to yell at Lumiere. But, the tall, annoying man wasn't near him. Cogsworth reached to touch his face with his hand, and when he pulled his hand away, he found a wetness on his fingertips. He was crying.

The entire staff was lamenting, barely able to comprehend that their Mistress wasn't… alive anymore. She had barely been half their age, and most of her life had been spent as a monster. They all remembered her birth, her first words, her first steps. And now, they would have to remember her death.

"M…mama?" Chip whispered quietly, tugging at her apron. Damian heard the small voice and looked up at the staff, but there was no recognition in his dark eyes.

"Who are you?" he asked, his voice thick from the grief.

"Damian, it's us," Babette said.

"The staff," Claude elaborated sadly.

_The employerless staff. _They all thought.

* * *

Damian wasn't quite sure what was real or not anymore. All he was certain of was the undeniable pain in his heart every time he looked at the woman who took Bella's place. She was a constant reminder of his failure to do the one thing he set out to do: keep Bella safe.

"I'm so sorry," Damian sobbed, not meeting any of the stranger's eyes. "So, so sorry," Damian didn't have to look up to feel the worried looks they were giving him. "I couldn't save her. I couldn't save Bella! An enchantress took her and left this girl in her place. I'm sorry,"

When the people were silent for more than a usual amount of time, Damian looked up. He saw them exchange sad glances before one of them asked,

"Do you know, Young Gerard? Who is the girl?" it wasn't just the nickname which made him sound like Damian's candelabrum friend. His accent, and the way he phrased his question, too, added to his personality. Damian found himself thinking that while Lumiere was still a candelabrum, Bella had still been alive, and the thought caused him even more sadness.

Still, Damian had the decency to answer the lanky man's question. He shook his head forlornly and said,

"I don't know,"

If Bella were still alive, she would have been able to tell the unspoken part of his sentence: _and I don't want to know._ The woman lying in front of him was his last connection to Bella. She was a reminder of the woman he loved, just as beautiful on the outside as Bella had been on the inside. But, she was also the reason she died. At least, in Damian's grief-stricken mind, she was.

However, Bella _wasn't_ there. So no one heard what he didn't say.

"Then I'll tell you, Monsieur. She's Mademoiselle Belladonna Casteoux,"

"What?" Damian blinked at the humanized Lumiere. That woman... that _human_ woman... was Bella? His Bella?

"What?" Lumiere asked, almost mockingly. "You didn't think that we always were furniture and monsters, did you?"

Damian hadn't really thought about it. The staff, no matter how woody or fragile, had become normal to him, as had Bella's hulking form, and her deep, rumbling voice. He hadn't really thought about it, because by the point of time he would have questioned all of their forms, their appearances weren't an issue for him anymore.

"But that doesn't matter now. She's gone," Damian said bitterly, eyeing the woman on the ground with a new attitude. He couldn't really believe that she was Bella, but it was nice to think that Bella wasn't completely gone.

"The enchantress would not let her die! How do you say? That would be so anticlimactic," the tall 'Lumiere' man said.

"Yes, Sir. She's probably just… sleeping. And you need to wake her up!" a pudgy man near an older woman in the front said.

"How?" Damian asked, allowing himself the hope that maybe… just maybe… he could bring Bella back to life.

"You love her?" an older woman in the front asked. The woman wasn't as old as his father, but she still had some wrinkles starting to appear on her face. Her hair was mostly brown, but there were a few silver streaks running through it. The small blonde boy from the corner had made his way to stand next to the woman, so Damian thought that the woman was Mrs. Potts.

"Bella? Absolutely," Damian said without pause.

"Then the answer is simple, Darling. Kiss her,"

Damian didn't even have a chance to voice his confusion before the tall lanky man with a brown ponytail scooped a curvy red-head into his arms.

"Ah! True love's kiss! Our enchantress _does_ seem like a romantic, no?"

The woman in his arms giggled slightly, but pulled out of Lumiere's arms. Damian turned his attention back to Mrs. Potts.

"Will it really work?" he asked her, feeling unbearably vulnerable. Losing Bella the first time had been devastating. If Damian allowed himself the hope that she was still alive, and that he could save her, and it ended up that he couldn't... Damian wasn't sure if he would be able to recover from that.

"How can you know if you never try?" the human Mrs. Potts coaxed gently.

Damian turned to the woman. She was still lying on the ground, her hair around her like a dark halo. Her lips were full and pink, her complexion flawless, her color unhealthily pale. She was by _no_ means ugly, but Damian still wasn't one hundred percent certain that she was Bella. However… if there was even the slightest chance…

Damian took a deep breath and moved towards the woman's face, putting his hand under her neck to bring her closer to him. He tried to be gentle; he felt as if the slightest harsh movement would break her, even more than she already was.

His lips brushed hers, and Damian was surprised by the spark he felt with the contact. She wasn't even kissing him back and Damian could feel butterflies fluttering in his stomach. But, he also felt guilty. He loved Bella, and now he was kissing this woman, who he wasn't even sure was her, while she was unconscious, and couldn't even fight him off if she didn't want that kind of contact. So, sooner than he would have liked, Damian pulled away and stared apprehensively down at the woman's face, waiting for any form of color to appear. Before he could get disappointed again, Damian squeezed his eyes close and fought to keep the tear inside of his eye.

"What happened?" a sweet voice mumbled. Damian's eyes snapped open, and he immediately scrambled to his feet and took a few steps back.

The woman was still on the ground, but she was slowly getting up. Bella's humanized staff was still standing in the background, probably wanting to see how everything would pan out. The woman stiffly brought her arm up to rub the back of her head. She winced slightly, and Damian felt his heart drop. She didn't sound the same at all. This woman was probably very nice... but Damian was almost positive that she wasn't Bella.

The woman slowly sat up, and after taking a deep breath, she stood on her feet. She swayed for a moment, but as soon as her eyes locked with Damian's, he wasn't so sure he was completely stable either.

Her eyes were the same shade of mysterious gray that he had been slowly falling in love with over the last couple of months. Damian felt himself getting lost in them, but to keep himself from staring at the woman, he moved his gaze to the ground.

"Damian?" the woman asked breathlessly, and Damian found himself stepping closer. He reached out and ran his hands through her long wavy locks. Before he could tell himself to stop, Damian found himself moving impossibly closer and breathing in the scent of her hair. Rose.

Damian pulled back a little, grabbed the woman's her upper arms, and looked her straight in her eyes. He couldn't believe what he was experiencing. This woman _was _Bella. Her eyes were the same bewitching shade of gray, she said his name the same way, her hair felt as silky as before, and it smelled exactly like newly bloomed roses.

"It's you! You're alive!" Damian didn't even care that his voice cracked. He just couldn't believe that Bella was alive. She looked different, but beautiful all the same.

Damian didn't give himself time to think that Bella's entire staff was watching, or that Bella was probably still disoriented. He swooped down- it was strange being taller than Bella, a good strange- and picked her up. She gasped in surprise, but looked at him with complete adoration in her eyes. Damian swore he could hear her heart beating frantically between their tight-pressed chests, but then he realized it was more likely his own.

He leaned forward and pressed his lips against hers again, feeling a raging fire burning in his stomach. He kissed her, softly, lovingly, smiling happily against her mouth.

Damian pulled away and set her back down on the ground before cupping her face in his hands and resting his forehead on hers. He swallowed before he whispered,

"I love you,"

He wasn't sure what he was expecting, but it sure wasn't her glassy eyes, or her whispering back,

"I love you, too,"

Damian leaned in and kissed her again. He was so lost in a world in which only he and Bella resided that he barely heard the staff clapping for them. He barely cared. Bella was in front of him. She was alive, and she loved him. That was all that mattered.

**One more chapter, guys! Man, has this been a journey. I'm really proud of my work, and I'm glad that I have faithful followers who read my story and review and favorited it and stuff. Thanks to y'all, I maintained the confidence to finish this story. Thanks for favoriting, following, and reviewing :)**


	20. Epilogue: Forever

**Chapter 20**

**Damian/Bella**

Damian grinned at Lumiere, who was straightening out Damian's black ("I told you, Claire, blue is out! _O__ut!_") jacket. The tall man was a lot more accepting of his and Bella's relationship than Damian would have thought he would be, but Damian wasn't complaining. There was nothing _for_ Damian to complain about.

The sun was shining, the sky was blue, the air was warm. It was a beautiful summer day, and he was getting married. He and Bella. They were marrying each other. They were promising each other that the rest of their lives would be dedicated to only the other. Damian was making the biggest and best commitment of his life. And everyone was going to be witness to it.

And Damian truly meant _everyone. _Everyone in Damian's hometown was invited, as well as the three nearest towns to it, and all of their nobles, and the nobles' friends and family. Bella _was_ a Casteoux, after all. There was no way the first in line for the Casteoux name could get married without everyone being there to witness it.

_That's right, _Damian realized with a start. _Bella's a Casteoux. _

With all of the drama and intrigue surrounding her, it was very easy to overlook Bella's surname. But now that she and her staff were all human, and her castle was restored and she was actively and openly going back to doing her duties as a noblewoman, it was impossible to imagine her without picturing her title, her wealth, her power.

Damian was brought back to the night he had given the one hundred and twenty coins to LeFou, like it was nothing. Bella certainly was rich.

Damian, for the first time since his proposal, started to become nervous, and began pacing. What if Bella had expectations he couldn't meet? What if she figured out how much of a flawed man Damian was? What if she one day woke up and realized that she could do so much better than him?

Damian ran his hands through his hair and groaned. The day had started out so happily for Damian. Why were these doubts starting to invade his mind now?

"Damian?" his father called, and Damian spun around to face the old man. For the first time in years, Damian needed his advice.

"Dad!" Damian practically yelled. The old man stumbled back a bit before chuckling softly. Barely a cough left the old man's mouth. Damian wasn't sure exactly how, but Silas's cooking seemed to have magical healing properties. Maybe the enchantress was more generous than anyone had thought.

Damian's father waddled happily over to the bed in Damian's old room and sat down, careful not to wrinkle the shirt of the dress jacket which Lumiere had worked so hard to smooth.

"What is it, Son? Pre-wedding jitters?" his father slapped his knee and started laughing again, like it was some huge joke. But when Damian didn't join in with the laughter, the old man sobered immediately and said, "So, you're getting nervous now, eh?"

"Yes!" Damian cried, "What if she doesn't say yes? What if she realizes that she actually _doesn't_ love me? What if… what if she already realized it and doesn't even come down the aisle? What if-"

Damian was cut off by his old man's laughter, except this time, his father didn't stop laughing until there were tears streaming out of his eyes.

"Oh, son. _That's_ what you're worried about?"

"Yes," Damian said defensively, "It's a real issue that could happen. She's a noble, Dad,"

"A noble who loves you," his father said softly.

"She probably only thought so because I was the only one who was nice to her while she wasn't human,"

"Oh, no," his father said, "That's not the case at all. From what I've heard from the staff around here, you were quite the ungrateful guest, Damian,"

Damian almost argued, but then stopped he really _had_ been quite horrible to Bella during his first few weeks in her castle. So why did she love him?

"Then why is she marrying me, Dad?"

"I wouldn't know for certain, but I'm quite sure that it's because she loves you. Now, you can't do anything about her actions, or her thoughts, or her emotions. All you can do is control yourself.

"Promise me, Son, that you'll take care of her and love her,"

"I will," Damian said firmly, no hesitation whatsoever.

"Don't hurt her," his father warned, and Damian physically started feeling sick at the thought of causing any type of harm to Bella, his precious Bella.

"Never," Damian vowed. And with that, the two men made their way to the wedding.

* * *

Bella's smile was starting to hurt her cheeks. But there was honestly nothing she could do about it. Or wanted to do, for that matter. She was ecstatic. Over the moon. Joyous beyond belief. Why _not_ smile? After all, this was probably the most important day in her life.

In front of her, the man who she was in love with was promising himself to her for the rest of their lives. He was holding her hands, and staring into her eyes, and Bella could tell that he was just as happy and excited as she was. She could feel his elevated heartbeat through their joined hands, and Bella could see the priest giving Damian the ring. _Her _ring.

Most of the ceremony zoomed by for Bella, but she never stopped smiling. A few tears might have escaped her eyes, but they were happy tears. Congratulatory tears. A few might have come from the pain in her cheeks, but most were from the overwhelming sense of delight running through her veins.

She was so mesmerized in Damian's dark eyes that he had to squeeze her hands lightly before she had stumbled over some of the most powerful words she would ever have the pleasure to say in her life.

"What? Oh! Of course I do! Yes, yes, I do!"

Bella had never remembered a time when she was so happy. For the past ten years, she had been trapped in the body of a monster, and before that, she had been a lonely young girl, ignored by her parents. But, as Bella stared into Damian's dark eyes, she found all of the grievances from her past melting into a puddle of sorrow for one of her new maids to mop up.

Bella leaned up to kiss Damian, but he surprised her. Instead of pressing his lips to his _wife's_ lips, like he was expected to, Bella's _husband_ bent down and scooped Bella up, supporting her weight by pressing his hand to her lower back and holding her from under her knees. To help him carry her weight, Bella wrapped her arms around Damian's neck.

Since Bella was quite comfortable where she was, and she didn't want Damian to put her down to kiss her, Bella pulled Damian's head towards her own and kissed him soundly.

There was loud applause and many cheers from the congregation when they finally pulled away from each other, but Bella wasn't paying attention. She somehow moved her body closer to Damian's and rested her forehead against his, staring directly into his soulful chocolate eyes. The pure tenderness and admiration that shown in them was unmistakable, and Bella felt the balloon of love expand in her stomach until she felt like it would explode.

Bella put her hand to Damian's jaw, enjoying the strange new coolness of the ring on her third finger. She kissed him again, softly this time, trying to show to Damian exactly how much she loved him. She pulled away and couldn't help but to notice how handsome Damian was.

Damian started walking back down the aisle, towards the castle. He brought Bella closer to himself and nuzzled her neck.

_We're going to spend the rest of our lives together,_ he seemed to say. Bella laughed,

_Yeah. _She pecked his neck. _And it's going to be great._

**All done! It's been an enjoyable journey, thx! :)**


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